Secunia Research: Microsoft Excel Record Parsing Array Indexing Vulnerability

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                     Secunia Research 09/06/2009

   - Microsoft Excel Record Parsing Array Indexing 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 Office Excel 2000

NOTE: Other versions may also be affected.

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2) Severity 

Rating: Highly 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 due to an array-indexing error when 
processing certain records. This can be exploited to corrupt memory 
via a specially crafted Excel file.

Successful exploitation may allow execution of arbitrary code.

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5) Solution 

Apply patches from MS09-021.

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6) Time Table 

06/01/2009 - Vendor notified.
07/01/2009 - Vendor response.
08/01/2009 - Additional information provided to the vendor.
08/01/2009 - Vendor response.
19/02/2009 - Vendor provides status update.
24/04/2009 - Vendor provides status update.
22/05/2009 - Vendor provides status update.
09/06/2009 - 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-2009-0558 for the vulnerability.

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9) About Secunia

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10) Verification 

Please verify this advisory by visiting the Secunia website:
http://secunia.com/secunia_research/2009-1/

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

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