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Microsoft: New KB4461529 Patches Won’t Fix the Last Patches

It’s been weeks since the new Windows 10 patch started to delete the files of the users, so Microsoft wanted to fix Outlook 2010, with a November patch that pretty much made it worse.

On the 13th of November, Microsoft offered a security update, called KB4461529, which fixed four problems. These problems allowed a remote code execution when users created an Office file. This problem was then fixed for the  .msi 64-bit version of Outlook 2010 – but in the worst case – they had the program not working at all. Microsoft then told the users not to uninstall the patch, but to use the Outlook Web Access until they can properly solve the problem. So they start writing a second patch, which was released after the 21st of November. They said it would fix all the problems.

These are not the only problems

We must mention this is not the first time Outlook 2010 has problems this month. At the beginning of it, on the 6th, they released two updates, KB2863821 and KB4461522, which had the plan to fix the Japanese calendar, in order to support new ages. These new patches made the Access crash on startup. Sometimes it simply removed them.

The Japanese calendar got its idea of “ages” from China. These ages, or eras, showed the emperor’s reign. You get a new one every few years, so.maybe Microsoft wants to take this example when it tries to make software patches?

Microsoft offered Office patched before. One from the last year made the text simply disappear from the tables in Word, thing that made its users panic and overwhelm the company with complaints. The next patch gave the users similar problems. The problems were fixed in October.

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Windows 10 Mail App To Boast Ads Similar To Google Gmail

Windows 10 could make room for advertising in some of its applications, such as its email client. Indeed, some Windows 10 mail app users in many countries have noticed the presence of ads in the form of emails, says The Verge. An initiative that seems to be inspired by its competitor Google which has already added such ads in Gmail.

Microsoft to add ads in Windows 10 mail app for non-Office 365 subscribers

We do not know precisely what drives Microsoft to follow in the footsteps of Google’s Gmail as Windows 10 is, after all, a paid software since the Windows 10 license is included in the price of new computers. Accordingly, users may not appreciate this very unpleasant new feature.

However, the Redmond-based tech giant announced the addition of ads in the Windows 10 mail app via Frank Shaw, Microsoft’s communications manager, who also explained that it was ultimately just a test that should have never reached the general public. According to the official, Windows 10 mail app will boast ads for non-Office 365 subscribers.

Microsoft promised not to scan email to display targeted content

“The company [Microsoft] had decided to disable these ads. He also said that the experiment was never designed to be tested on a large scale, which does not support the existence of an FAQ on a pilot program implemented in several countries around the world, but the ads should disappear. If some users have seen advertising on the application, it should disappear quickly,” said Frank Shaw for The Verge.

On the positive side of this experience, we note the fact that Microsoft refuses to scan emails in order to display targeted content. The company has always refused to give in to this kind of practice and has even tackled Google in the past on this subject. As a consequence, Gmail has also decided to stop scanning emails since then.

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Windows 10 October 2018 Update Conflicts With Specific Intel Drivers

Microsoft’s operating system update, Windows 10 October 2018 Update, is already the company’s worst release to date, according to many reports from both IT specialists and regular users. After the update rolled out, it began to come to light the multitude of bugs it contained, culminating with the error that deleted the personal files of some users.

In the middle of this month, Microsoft released a supposed version that corrected these bugs, but others have remained untouched and are still causing a lot of problems for users. Facing with this humiliating situation, Microsoft has chosen to block the Windows 10 October 2018 Update for some users because of some conflict with specific audio drivers of the computers that upgraded to the new version.

Some users have witnessed that the sound on their computers shuts down unexpectedly, while others have observed that their screens turn darker with no apparent reasons. Also, the most unfortunate users are still experiencing the deletion of personal files caused by Windows 10 October 2018 Update, although they installed the patch that supposedly fixes this issue.

Windows 10 October 2018 Update Still Causing Problems For Users

Microsoft has come out to report on some compatibility problems between its Windows 10 October 2018 Update with several Intel drivers released in September. The giant tech company points out that these activate functions that are not compatible with Windows and therefore cause the failures.

Those affected drivers include versions 24.20.100.6344 and 24.20.100.6345, which cause Microsoft to be blocking the Windows 10 October 2018 Update on specific computers, as well as advising users to contact technical support to disable the incompatibility. To find out if your computer is affected by this issues, you have to go to the Device Manager, display the Screen Adapters tab, right-click on the Intel drivers and click Properties.

There you must check the version of the driver and, if you find one of the before-mentioned ones, contact Microsoft for help.

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Microsoft To Allow FIDO2 Authentication Without The Need Of Entering Usernames And Passwords

Microsoft now simplifies and secures the connection to a Microsoft account with the support of security keys based on the FIDO2 standard. Users can log into their account without having to re-enter the username and password. Microsoft now supports secure USB keys that allow users to connect to all the company’s services without entering their username and associated password.

Microsoft is, luckily, ready to allow users to authenticate to the company’s services using secure USB keys via FIDO2 standard. With this feature, users of Outlook, Office, OneDrive, Bing, Skype, and Xbox Live can authenticate without entering their username and associated password every time they would like to connect.

Microsoft to support FIDO2 standard to ease up the authentication protocol for its services

That applies to all Microsoft services, including Outlook, Office, OneDrive, Bing, Skype, and Xbox Live. Microsoft will support authentication keys, such as Yubico’s Yubikey and Feitian Biopass. The keys only have to be inserted into a USB port of the device concerned to be operated. For smartphones, the same would be available but only through Bluetooth or NFC.

This feature eliminates the need to identify with two-factor authentication. The WebAuthn authentication technology from the FIDO (Fast Identity Online) consortium consists of a web API (programming interface) that provides new, simpler and more secure means of authentication.

You’ll need the Windows 10 October 2018 Update to take advantage of the FIDO2 authentication feature in Microsoft’s services

Thanks to FIDO’s CTAP (Client to Authenticator Protocol), WebAuthn allows you to use different systems to authenticate yourself. USB security keys are one of these means. To benefit from this new feature, it is necessary to have the last update of Windows 10, namely, the Windows 10 October 2018 Update.

Once you update, it would then become possible to configure Windows Hello or a physical security key from Yubico or FEITIAN that supports the FIDO2 standard.

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Microsoft Fixed a Windows 10 Zero-Day Vulnerability With The November Patch Tuesday Release

In its latest list of security updates, Microsoft announced, among other things, that it had fixed a Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability discovered by cybersecurity researchers. This vulnerability would have benefited many hackers.

November 13th, 2018, it was the second Tuesday of the month. And the second Tuesday of the month is known as Patch Tuesday, the day when Microsoft unveils its latest security patches for its software. In this newest edition, the firm has fixed a zero-day vulnerability, revealed by the IT security researchers at Kaspersky Lab, a company specializing in computer security.

The Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability would have been actively exploited

The flaw identified concerned the win32k.sys file and could allow malicious users to use it to increase their privileges on 32-bit Windows 7 systems. But for that, according to Microsoft, it was still necessary to be able to install malware on the targeted computers. A difficulty that did not frighten the hackers, since, according to Kaspersky Lab teams, this Windows 10 zero-day vulnerability was already widely exploited by many cybercriminals. It was called Advanced Persistent Threat (APT).

This announcement comes after the fix of another zero-day vulnerability, made in the October Patch Tuesday. The latter was related to win32.sys and had been spotted by Kaspersky Lab, also.

Microsoft has not yet fixed another zero-day vulnerability, though

On the other hand, it seems that Microsoft did not have time to implement another zero-day vulnerability in Windows 10, affecting Windows Data Sharing Service (dssvc.dll). Revealed a few weeks ago, this security flaw can allow a third party to recover data from an SSD disk, bypassing BitLocker’s data encryption, without any passwords required.

Microsoft did provide some tips to its users, however, on how to configure BitLocker to stay protected. In the meantime, Microsoft fixed a severe zero-day vulnerability with its November Patch Tuesday while we already look forward to the future security patch, which should appear on the second Tuesday of December.

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