back to article The big day is here and it's time to decide: Patch Flash, Windows, Office or Android first?

Today is the second Tuesday of the month, and that means a fresh round of security updates from the likes of Microsoft, Adobe and Google. The November edition of Patch Tuesday brings with it fixes for Windows, Flash Player, Internet Explorer, Edge, Office and Android. For Microsoft, the monthly update comprises a total of 14 …

  1. N2
    Trollface

    Why not

    Just dump the lot?

    You'd be better off & certainly more secure.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Why not

      windows:- check

      flash:- check

      android, wish there was actually something to replace this with!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Why not

        Could always replace Android with Windows Phone… I hear it's so unpopular not even the viruses support it.

      2. Jeffrey Nonken

        Re: Why not

        Drink the kool-aid; buy an iPhone.

        Or just throw your smartphone away and get a flip phone.

      3. Carl D

        Re: Why not

        Windows 7 SP1 level only still offline (as always) - check.

        Posting this with Linux Mint - up to date (as always) - check.

        No 'Patch Tuesday' dramas for me, once again.

        So glad I don't have to deal with MS's BS anymore. Life's too short...

        1. Carl D

          Re: Why not

          Oh, almost forgot about my Samsung Galaxy Tab 3 10.1 inch tablet.

          Any Android updates for that today? Nope? Didn't think so.

          Hasn't had any for over 2 years.

          Guess I'll just have to carry on using Firefox with the NoScript, uBlock Origin and Self Destructing Cookies add-ons.

          Lucky I don't keep anything important on it.

  2. JustNiz

    Why patch flash? Just uninstall it. Adobe have already proved they can't write stable, secure software even if their business depended on it.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Makes you wonder how they manage with Photoshop.

      One could always patch the files with bits from /dev/zero…

      1. Richard 12 Silver badge

        They haven't!

        Unfortunately an older, non-"Creative Cloud" version of Photoshop is still the only viable option for many professionals.

        Which is terrible because you can't buy that anymore.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Time to decide?

    Well I'm never going to see an android patch to apply to my phone (at least I certainly haven't yet), so I can safely put that last.

    1. Eddy Ito
      Alert

      Re: Time to decide?

      I agree in part, "last" - definitely, "safely" - not so sure.

    2. Dan 55 Silver badge

      Re: Time to decide?

      It's difficult for an exploit to get persistent root if your Android's running SELinux, which all Androids on or above 4.4 do.

      1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

        Re: Time to decide?

        It's difficult for an exploit to get persistent root if your Android's running SELinux, which all Androids on or above 4.4 do.

        Yeah, but that doesn't make for very good headlines!

        The Dirty COW is yet another example of an exploit that depends as much on social engineering as it does on the coding. Not trying to downplay the threat in any way but this vulnerability affects a small percentage of a huge market. There are reasons for Russia being targeted over say the UK and even the banks are waking up to the need to implement at least something that looks bit more like security in their apps.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Time to decide?

          The Dirty COW is yet another example of an exploit that depends as much on social engineering as it does on the coding.

          As do most exploits these days.

          Click to download, ignore all warnings, click to install, ignore all warnings.

          Done.

    3. Jeffrey Nonken

      Re: Time to decide?

      I put Cyanogenmod on mine. A bit of bother, but worth it in the long run, for me.

      Not for everybody though.

    4. big_D Silver badge

      Re: Time to decide?

      Update not showing up on my Nexus 5X yet.

  4. bombastic bob Silver badge
    WTF?

    malformed flash media files... ?

    "The vulnerabilities could be used by an attacker for remote code execution by way of malformed Flash media files."

    Adobe programmers must be a COLOSSAL PILE OF FAIL if they're *STILL* dealing with FLASH VULNERABILITIES like this...

    I mean, SERIOUSLY: have they NOT heard of PARAMETER VALIDATION and BUFFER LENGTH CHECKING??? Why can't they just run a SIMPLE sanity check on EVERY file before playing it? Or every segment, as needed. Whatever. Point is, if they are storing things in the file that COULD cause buffer overruns or 'wild writes' within RAM space, then they're TOTALLY INCOMPETENT as far as software is concerned.

    And I would say that it REFLECTS ON THE QUALITY OF THE ENTIRE COMPANY'S PRODUCTS.

  5. Teiwaz

    Patch time.

    Nevermind the OS, time to patch the US and UK, series flaws have arisen.

  6. Doctor_Wibble
    Unhappy

    Yay another 37-hour wait

    Surely not just me, is Win7 now de-prioritised? WU sits there 'checking for updates', and will finally find some tomorrow or the day after, and takes another day or two before the download counter gets off zero. Or is it because I tried to hide all the Win10 upgrade thingies which kept reappearing?

    I've done all the clear-everything reset-everything do-this do-that bag-on-yer-ead stuff so weird theories only please, I'm wondering if e.g. it's trying IP6 (disabled) for everything first or trying to cross-reference blocked cookies or because I never used IE on here (or did I)...

    1. Sparkypatrick

      Re: Yay another 37-hour wait

      This might help. https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3200747

      1. Doctor_Wibble
        Thumb Up

        Re: Yay another 37-hour wait

        Much appreciated - when searching (via more than one search engine) that one never showed up! They are obviously conspiring against me...

        The first patch said 'not applicable to your computer' (though I do recall seeing 'servicing stack' relatively recently but the KB number on that page does not show as installed), but the second one went in fine, and it looks like that's cured the problem so have a mere single upvote even though you deserve several for that :)

  7. Artaxerxes

    Very very unhappy with the Microsoft changes. Am going to have to be very wary incase they dump an "optional" patch on me that adds that diagnostic service back in or as is almost certain a general dodgy patch.

    Also the changes to the download site make it even more annoying to download a patch.

    1. Carl D

      Yes - watch out. From what I've been reading they're still trying to sneak the telemetry updates into W7 and 8.1 (for those people who have avoided them so far) and it looks like MS are going to make it more and more difficult to avoid them with these monthly 'rollups' for W7 and 8.1

  8. Jonjonz

    My HP laptops Services started hanging on boot.

    To day my computer would not complete start up. I was able to start it in safe mode, and following Win 10 support instructions I disabled all non microsoft start up services, and then the pc booted fine.

    Next by process of restarting with individual non microsoft services enabled, it was clear the HP services were what was hanging. HP support site seems to unaware of this issue.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: My HP laptops Services started hanging on boot.

      First rule of using an OEM image.

      Uninstall all bloatware, not most. ALL.

      Be careful of uninstalling McAffe as it may brick you internet connection. Get the heap of shit, sorry McAfee, removal tool and run that after MS uninstaller, otherwise your internet connection WILL be fucked.

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