Top Apps Largely Forgo Windows Security Protections
Summary: A Secunia analysis released in July 2010 found that at least 50 percent of the third-party Windows applications it examined, including Apple QuickTime, Foxit Reader, Google Picasa, Java, OpenOffice.org, RealPlayer, VLC Player and Winamp, did not invoke either DEP or ASLR. Secunia said DEP adoption was slow and uneven across OS versions and that ASLR support was improperly implemented by nearly all vendors, while VLC's maker said version 1.1.0 used both features, Foxit said its next major release would, and Google said it planned to in a future release.
Bottom line: Secunia's own specialist noted that most Microsoft applications take full advantage of DEP and ASLR while third-party applications had yet to adapt, and that combined with the rising number of vulnerabilities in third-party software, an attacker's choice to target a popular third-party application over a Microsoft product becomes very understandable.
Read the original at Krebs on Security ↗
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