Microsoft’s patch update for this month fell on Tuesday this week as they issued ten of the eleven scheduled security patches. These patches fixes 26 security vulnerabilities, the largest number of flaws fixed with one patch update since they began their monthly patch cycle. Six of these patches are important; five of these fix critical vulnerabilities in the Windows shell and Office suites that hackers may exploit to remotely control your system. The last one is an update for the Windows Service that could allow a denial of service attack. An out-of-cycle patch has also been released last month dealing with the VML-exploit on Internet Explorer web browser.

Since programs are constantly evolving to improve usability and performance, as time passes problems may arise as glitches in the source code gets revealed. Installing these patches is essential for ensuring your computer system’s security. Not only do these patches fix any bugs that are known to attackers, they also fix any privately disclosed ones that security researchers have uncovered and reported to the software company. In the days after a patch is released hackers will attempt to exploit these formerly-undisclosed vulnerabilities on unpatched computers.

If you have the option to receive reminders for these patches for your system and applications, use it. Then check out if they’re stable before installing them. Of course, glitches can happen all the time. Users have reported delays in receiving patches from the Windows Update system, but they have been advised to manually download the patches from the download site.

[tags]Microsoft, security patches[/tags]