The Microsoft Tax: Windows 7 zero-day flaw enables attackers to cripple PCs; Macintosh unaffected
"In a security advisory, Microsoft acknowledged that a bug in SMB (Server Message Block), a Microsoft-made network file and print-sharing protocol, could be used by attackers to cripple Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 machines," Keizer reports. "The zero-day vulnerability was first reported by Canadian researcher Laurent Gaffie last Wednesday, when he revealed the bug and posted proof-of-concept attack code to the Full Disclosure security mailing list and his blog. According to Gaffie, exploiting the flaw crashes Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 systems so thoroughly that the only recourse is to manually power off the computers."
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9140858/Microsoft_confirms_first_Windows_7_zero_day_bugKeizer reports, "Attacks could be aimed at any browser, not just Internet Explorer (IE), Microsoft warned. After tricking users into visiting a malicious site or a previously-compromised domain, hackers could feed them specially-crafted URIs (uniform resource identifier), and then crash their PCs with malformed SMB packets."






