Friday, January 12th, 2007

Poop hits the fan with PDF files… (Adobe Acrobat Reader Security Alert)

Jim Edwards here with a *CRITICAL* update…

I was alerted to this problem by one of my trusty www.TheNetReporter.com subscribers.

It seems a major security problem with Adobe Acrobat Reader (used to view PDF files) came to light this week.

It appears hackers can use Acrobat Reader to launch malicious code. This has been public knowledge among hackers for over a week.

You can read about it here:

http://www.toptechnews.com/news/Adobe-Patches-Acrobat-Security-Flaw/story.xhtml?story_id=03000118GZYU

Adobe has issued information about the fix which is available here:

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/bulletins/apsb07-01.html

If you publish PDF files on your website, you need to read this page and have your webmaster, your web host, or yourself take appropriate action. (We will be taking appropriate action on our sites immediately).

http://www.adobe.com/support/security/advisories/apsa07-02.html

THE BOTTOM LINE: If you want to avoid problems, according to Adobe, upgrade your version of Acrobat Reader to ver 8 or later and you won't have a problem.

Ver 8 is apparently NOT available as a patch, but rather you must do a new install of Acrobat Reader 8, available from http://www.adobe.com/go/getreader

Hey, I don't make the news… I only report it.

This does not appear to be a baseless scare, but rather something you *need* to take action on.

1. Get the facts

2. Upgrade your version of Reader as appropriate (it's free)

3. Keep your eyes open for news on this issue

If you have a comment about this, feel free to do so on my blog at: http://www.IGottaTellYou.com/blog/

NOTE: We *cannot* answer any technical support questions on this issue…

Jim


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3 Responses

January 12, 2007

Hi Jim

Thanks for the heads-up on this …

As someone who’s dealt with Acrobat update problems before, I would strongly recommend if you have V6.x or earlier you do not try to update it and instead uninstall it and download/install the full v8 from Adobe.

V7+ users shouldn’t have any problems …

HTH

Cheers

Nick :)


January 12, 2007

Jim,

Speaking as a certified computer security professional, I want to thank you for using your position of influence to alert your customers and readers about this vulnerability.

As you mentioned in your blog post and email, this is *NOT* a “baseless scare”, and I encourage everybody reading this post to follow the steps you outlined.

Best regards,
Tom Brownsword
Certified Computer Security Professional
Internet Marketing Wanna-Be