Secunia Research: Microsoft Excel Lotus 1-2-3 File Parsing Vulnerability

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                 Secunia Research 12/10/2010

 - Microsoft Excel Lotus 1-2-3 File Parsing Vulnerability -

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Table of Contents

Affected Software…1
Severity…2
Vendor's Description of Software…3
Description of Vulnerability…4
Solution…5
Time Table…6
Credits…7
References…8
About Secunia…9
Verification…10

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1) Affected Software

• Microsoft Excel 2002 SP3
• Microsoft Excel 2003 SP3

NOTE: Other versions may also be affected.

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2) Severity

Rating: Moderately critical
Impact: System compromise
Where: Remote

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3) Vendor's Description of Software

"Microsoft Office Excel is a powerful tool you can use to create and
format spreadsheets, and analyze and share information to make more
informed decisions.".

Product Link:
http://office.microsoft.com/excel

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4) Description of Vulnerability

Secunia Research has discovered a vulnerability in Microsoft Excel,
which can be exploited by malicious people to compromise a user's
system.

The vulnerability is caused by a boundary error in the parsing of
certain records in Lotus 1-2-3 workbooks. This can be exploited to
cause a heap-based buffer overflow via a Lotus 1-2-3 file containing
a specially crafted, overly long record.

Successful exploitation may allow execution of arbitrary code.

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5) Solution

Apply patches provided by MS10-080.

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6) Time Table

09/04/2010 - Vendor notified.
09/04/2010 - Vendor response.
25/05/2010 - Vendor provides status update.
30/09/2010 - Vendor provides status update.
12/10/2010 - Public disclosure.

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7) Credits

Discovered by Carsten Eiram, Secunia Research.

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8) References

The Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) project has assigned
CVE-2010-3233 for the vulnerability.

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9) About Secunia

Secunia offers vulnerability management solutions to corporate
customers with verified and reliable vulnerability intelligence
relevant to their specific system configuration:

http://secunia.com/advisories/business_solutions/

Secunia also provides a publicly accessible and comprehensive advisory
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http://secunia.com/secunia_research/

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http://secunia.com/advisories/mailing_lists/

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10) Verification

Please verify this advisory by visiting the Secunia website:
http://secunia.com/secunia_research/2010-55/

Complete list of vulnerability reports published by Secunia Research:
http://secunia.com/secunia_research/

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