Microsoft Office exploits are cunningly-crafted, deliberately malformed chunks of data, inserted into Office files, that crash the application in a way that gives cybercriminals control, so that they can install malware without you noticing.
With a reliable exploit in hand, they don’t need to persuade you to click a web link, or to download and install a program, or to enable Office macros (which are off by default,
with very good reason) and re-open the document at a lower security level.
Just opening the document to read it, or in some cases merely looking at it in a preview window, may be enough to infect your computer with malware.
TRACKING THE THREAT
In order to keep track of the burgeoning appetite of the criminals for Office-based attacks, we’ve been monitoring the usage patterns of the most popular Microsoft Office exploits.
