Back in the late 90s’ the first macro viruses appeared on the scene. The leveraged a feature of Microsoft Office that allowed a malware developer to execute programmed instructions via the office interface. This new option opened a lot of avenues for inserting a malicious payload on to a target system. Now some 20+ years later Microsoft is finally really doing something about this hole in their Office product. The are blocking all downloaded/external macros by default.

A vulnerability disclosed and patched in January is rearing its ugly head. Identified as CVE-2022-21882, this vulnerability affects Windows 10, 11 and Windows Server. On its own it is a significant threat since is allows for a privilege escalation that can turn into a complete compromise of the targeted device. Not exactly what you want to leave open. The good news is that Microsoft released a patch for it in January.

The Go Programing Language (Go or Golang) was developed back in 2007 by a few engineers who were working at Google at the time. Go was launched in 2009 as an open-source programing language and it is primarily used in Google’s own production systems. It has been described as Python meets C and has syntax similarities with C and procedural similarities with Python (dynamic-typing etc.). So, you end up with a language that has quickness, security, and structure of a compiled programing language along with the development speed and simplicity of a dynamic language.

Containers are a popular item with cloud-based infrastructure. The idea of running low-cost (from a resource standpoint) systems to handle work loads while maintaining a higher level of security is a nice one. Making this type of decision does not mean that it puts them out of the reach of attackers though. We have seen several methods used by attackers to gain access to and control of the containers that that are in use. One of the latest is due to a 0-Day flaw in the Argo Continuous Deployment tool.