Microsoft is planning to release seven bulletins, including one to address a critical security issue, with its upcoming monthly patch update.

The company said that the 8 October Patch Tuesday release would include an update which would remedy a critical flaw in Microsoft Office and Microsoft Server. If targeted, the vulnerability could be exploited by an attacker to remotely execute code on a targeted system.

While Microsoft does not typically post details on vulnerabilities prior to the release of a patch, the company said that the flaw was only considered to be a critical risk for Word 2003, 2007 and 2010. The patch is listed as a less severe 'important' threat for the Sharepoint 2010 and Office Web Apps server packages.

All six of the remaining patches have been classified by the company as 'important' threat levels. The updates include fixes for remote code execution, elevation of privilege and denial of service vulnerabilities in Office, Windows and SQL servers.

V3.co.uk