There were 56 newly-reported vulnerabilities fixed in this month’s patches from Microsoft, with four of them offering attackers the chance of finding remote code execution (RCE) exploits.
Remote code execution is where otherwise innocent-looking data that’s sent in from outside your network can trigger a bug and take over your computer.
Bugs that make it possible for booby-trapped chunks of data to trick your computer into executing untrusted code are much sought after by cybercriminals, because they typically allow crooks to break in and implant malware…
…without popping up any “are you sure” warnings, without needing niceties like a username and a password, and sometimes without even leaving any obvious traces in your system logs.
With all of that in mind, the statistic “56 fixes including 4 RCEs” signals more than enough risk on its own to make patching promptly a priority.
