It can be daunting to determine who’s responsible for showing ads on the websites we visit, or who’s harvesting data from the mobile apps we use every day. That information is already semi-public, but it is not easily parsed and traditionally much of it has remained walled away in the hands of large advertising platforms. Not anymore: A powerful and free new service called DecryptAds scrapes and correlates this adtech data and makes it simple to quickly learn a great deal about the entities that are tracking you.

A Decryptads summary of the advertising partnerships declared by espn.com.

The newly launched decryptads.com says it is constantly scraping the files that websites and apps make publicly available to disclose the companies that are permitted to run ads or collect user data. These files include:

–ads.txt: all of the adtech companies and data brokers that may run ads or harvest data from the site;
–app-ads.txt: entities that can harvest data from or display ads on mobile and smart TV apps;
–buyers.json/sellers.json: the entities buying, selling or reselling ad inventory for a given site or app.

Zach Edwards is chief research officer for DecryptAds and a threat researcher at the security company Infoblox. Edwards said he and two other founders decided the service was needed because the adtech data in these files is generally only useful when it can be cross-referenced to build a more complete picture of the advertising ecosystem for each website or app.

“It’s an adtech tool but we’re trying to approach adtech from a security perspective,” Edwards said. “It’s really built for a lot of privacy and security use cases that have been dramatically underserved.”

Those use cases, he said, include tracking down the source of malicious ads that try to foist malware on targeted users, identifying ad networks located in adversarial nations, and detecting the fast growing swarms of AI-generated slop websites and apps. And as decryptads.com demonstrates, these potential security and privacy threats are near impossible to detect just by viewing a single apps.txt or app-ads.txt file.

“Supply-chain integrity issues rarely live in a single file,” the site explains. “They show up as broken cross-references between ads.txt, app-ads.txt, and sellers.json files; as cloned declaration sets across unrelated domains; as seller removals that only make sense when viewed across exchanges; and even as supply paths in bid logs that never actually appear in any given publisher’s authorized-seller list.”

A search in DecryptAds for the hugely popular sports network espn.com reveals 143 ad partners and 19 registered data broker domains are listed within its ads.txt and app-ads.txt files. That data broker information is gradually becoming available because four states — California, Oregon, Texas and Vermont — have recently passed laws requiring data brokers to register if they buy or sell data on consumers from those states. DecryptAds reports that almost half of those data brokers are collecting geolocation data from espn.com visitors who aren’t blocking ads, while another three disclose that they collect device fingerprints and sensitive personal information.

A visual representation of the complex ad supply chain declared by espn.com. Image: decryptads.com.

HIGH-RISK AD PARTNERS

DecryptAds also makes it easy to learn the beneficiaries and national origins of the advertising firms lurking in apps and websites, displaying a conspicuous warning when adtech partners of an app or website are based in “geo-risk” areas like China and Russia, or in countries with strong financial and political ties to both — such as Cyprus and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

According to DecryptAds, espn.com works with four different advertising entities that are based in either Russia, China or the UAE, including the adtech firm Between Digital, which lists a New York address. However, the dossier on Between Digital flags them as a Russian firm, showing that their publisher offers (PDF) are processed through Alfa Bank, Russia’s largest private commercial bank and one of several financial institutions placed under U.S. sanctions in 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine. KrebsOnSecurity sought comment from both Between Digital and the company’s founder, and will update this story in the event that either replies.

A search for several top U.S. military news websites — including armytimes.com, airforcetimes.com, defensenews.com, navytimes.com, marinecorpstimes.com and federaltimes.com — shows they all allow Between Digital to serve ads and track users, as well as two entities in the UAE and another in the ownership secrecy haven of Panama. DecryptAds reports that Between Digital is collecting ad data on approximately 55,000 partner websites.

The “Geo Risk” section of decryptads.com.

Pivoting on Between Digital’s app-ads.txt file reveals hundreds of domains featuring simple web-based games that are frequently interrupted by ads. Edwards said Between Digital’s own declarations show the company is listed as both a publisher and a reseller on approximately two-thirds of their portfolio.

“It means they are basically playing both sides of the bidding equation, which creates opportunities to direct client spend at your owned and operated properties or client infrastructure, essentially creating opportunities for conflicts of interest,” Edwards told KrebsOnSecurity. “The problem we have right now is that for years we’ve had almost no one policing these ads.txt and app-ads.txt files.”

The Opera Web browser remains quite popular, and probably many users are unaware that since 2016 it has been majority owned and controlled by the Chinese company Kunlun Tech (the operational headquarters of Opera remain in Oslo, Norway).

Opera.com’s profile at DecryptAds identifies 27 registered data brokers collecting information, including 15 adtech partners in the UAE, six in China, three in Cyprus, two in Russia and one each in Hong Kong and Ukraine. DecryptAds makes clear, however, that these companies represent just seven percent of the adtech partners specified in Opera.com’s ads.txt and app-ads.txt files.

LEGAL DOSSIERS

One feature of DecryptAds that sent this author down multiple hours-long research rabbit holes is its Legal Dossier lookup, which takes several minutes for each search but eventually churns out oodles of useful information about who owns a particular domain or app, when it was registered, and any aliases or relationships it may have to adtech companies and other websites or apps.

For example, last month KrebsOnSecurity wrote about researchers from Bitsight who found that an extremely popular line of TV streaming sticks called H96 quietly rent out each user’s Internet connection to strangers. Bitsight also discovered that when these devices aren’t being used to stream pirated video content, they are spoofing themselves as mobile phones clicking ads on AI-generated slop websites.

Bitsight concluded that the same Chinese company that made several of the malicious apps common to all of these H96 streaming sticks — the Fengwo Group — also also ran the network of ads and AI slop websites being clicked on by tens of thousands of these devices that are pretending to be mobile phones.

Examples of ad landing pages linked to the Fengwo Group. These sites were designed to show ads only to H96 devices that were spoofing their device type as mobile phones. Image: Bitsight.

A DecryptAds legal dossier on the (now dormant) Fengwo Group domain name for the AI slop website pictured on the left in the screenshot above (medicalbeautyhub dot com) shows it shares a seller ID (1674071) with a gaming website — giacoloredstones[.]com — which features yet another seller ID (103488000).

Pivoting on that latter seller ID reveals hundreds of active websites within Russia’s Yandex ad system featuring extremely low-quality games or simple utilities that pepper visitors with ads.

QUIET REMOVALS

Edwards said that when advertising networks suspect a given advertiser is engaged in unauthentic clicks or displaying malicious ads, very often those networks will quietly remove the offender from their list of approved partners without letting anyone else know about their suspicions.

This practice, he said, makes it easier for dodgy adtech firms to avoid accountability and continue victimizing others. To address that visibility gap, DecryptAds features a quiet removals feed that records and correlates all of the sellers.json removals across ad exchanges for the same seller domain or name.

A screenshot of the Quiet Removals Feed at decryptads.com.

“The way the adtech industry works, someone will write a report about ad fraud and only share it with their own clients and they won’t make it public,” Edwards said. “The ban is just removing them from the sellers.json file, but they told nobody. One day it was there, the next it was gone. So if you’re trying to navigate who is suspicious, that’s usually tough to do because there are a lot of adtech companies removing things all at once.”

MALVERTISING AND AI SLOP

Malvertising, the term given to the practice of inserting malicious ads that foist malware or redirect visitors to phishing pages, remains an all-too-frequent occurrence in the modern adtech industry. But Edwards said these malicious ads are far more commonly found now on newly generated AI slop websites than on high traffic destinations that typically employ a variety of technologies and third party tools to quickly flag bad ads.

“None of these slop AI content farms are paying for that kind of protection,” he said. “They’re just signing up the lowest quality partners, and it essentially becomes a greased rail to target the users of those sites with malicious ads. Most malvertising attacks don’t happen on espn.com or huffpost.com, but rather [on] some lower quality content farm and someone just went there because it came up in a search.”

Edwards said the AI slop websites are populated with machine-generated blog posts and images, and cover a wide array of themes from home improvement and decorating to food recipes, hunting, cars and consumer technology. He said organizations that get hit with malicious ads are often at a loss for what to do next, unaware that in most cases the answer is one of the entities listed inside the website’s ads.txt or app-ads.txt file.

“A lot of serious organizations are starting to understand that if we’re not breaking down this ad data, we’re not going to know who’s targeting government people with zero-click payloads on an almost daily basis,” he said.

Edwards maintains that truly getting a handle on the malvertising and AI slop problems will require more data-sharing by the major ad networks. Specifically, he says those platforms do not broadly share what’s known as the “supply chain object” or SCO, structured data attached to each advertising bid request that lets buyers see every seller, reseller and intermediary involved in passing an ad impression from the publisher to the final buyer.

“That SCO tells you who sold it or resold it, and who was the final entity that bought the impression that served that malware payload,” Edwards explained. “You may see the malicious zero-click redirection, but without the supply chain object — which is only served server side — you won’t know who targeted your people with malware and won’t have a way to try and prevent it properly. But if we can encourage the adtech industry to expose that SCO, it will get easier to find the culprit behind any one bad ad.”

DecryptAds also offers an application programming interface (API) that allows researchers to automate queries and integrate the site’s functionality into popular AI platforms.

WHAT CAN YOU DO?

The only sane reaction to the examples described above is to block all online ads outright. This approach is broadly endorsed by security experts because it also makes it more difficult for adtech firms and data brokers to build detailed profiles on you and track your movements around the web and in the real world.

However, much depends on how you normally prefer to browse the Internet, and how much trust you place in third party browser plugins and extensions. For those primarily surfing via a regular desktop or laptop Web browser, uBlock Origin Lite is an excellent free and well-maintained open source option. uBlock Origin also should work with mobile browsers like Firefox, but apparently only on Android-based devices.

Adblock Plus is a decent option for iPhone and iPad users. For power users, Adblock and uBlock Origin both support custom blocking rules from easylist.to, which publishes a frequently updated list that removes most advertisements from webpages.

The well established browser extension NoScript blocks all non-approved Javascript code, and it generally does a fine job blocking most ads from loading. However, script blockers like NoScript may not be suitable for average users who don’t enjoy constantly having to referee which scripts should be allowed to load so that each site displays properly.

More technically inclined/adventuresome readers should strongly consider a hardware approach to blocking ads at the local network level, because that is easily the cheapest, most secure and scalable way to do it. A tiny, low-cost and broadly available computer known as a Raspberry Pi can be turned into a powerful ad blocker for all devices on a local network when fitted with a microSD memory card and a free program called Pi-hole. Once you’ve set it up properly and changed your router’s network settings to use the Pi-hole’s DNS sinkhole and DHCP servers, it should prevent ads from displaying on any devices connected to that network.

Bear in mind that ad blockers often do little to block ads and/or tracking that occurs from within mobile apps that users have chosen to install on their devices. Many websites now push users to install a mobile app, supposedly in order to more fully access and enjoy the site’s services and content. But in my experience, they’re not doing this because the user experience is somehow way better on the app (as LinkedIn tries to convince us non-app users several times a week via email). On the contrary, I find most mobile apps to be horribly designed, annoying, and/or completely unnecessary, and when given the option I will almost always choose to interact with a website or service directly in a Web browser.

No, the cold truth is that big web destinations tend to get pushy with their apps because they make it easier for these companies to keep you on their platforms longer and to collect (and in many cases resell) far more precise data about who, what and where their users are. Also, companies pushing customers the hardest to install mobile apps always seem to liberally opt everyone in to having their data used to train large language models these days. So be cautious about the apps you install on your mobile devices (including any smart TVs!), and poke around their listings at DecryptAds if you want to learn more about their privacy practices and any relationships they may have to adtech firms.

Microsoft today released updates to remedy at least 398 security vulnerabilities in its Windows operating systems and supported software, including one weakness that is already being actively exploited and two others that were publicly detailed prior to today.

Image: Shutterstock, Mallika Home Studio.

August’s overstuffed bundle of patch joy from Microsoft did not eclipse its recording breaking release of more than 570 security updates last month, but it is double June’s then-record batch of nearly 200 fixes. Microsoft has attributed the recent patch deluge to vulnerability discoveries aided by artificial intelligence, and experts roundly agree that Windows users should get used to the idea of Patch Tuesdays (the second Tuesday of each month) covering hundreds of newly discovered security flaws.

Fully 42 of the 398 flaws that Microsoft patched today earned Redmond’s most-dire “critical” rating, meaning they are severe enough that malware or malcontents could exploit them to gain remote control over a Windows computer with little to no help from the user.

The sole known “zero day” bug fixed by Microsoft this month is CVE-2026-68820, a privilege escalation weakness in a core Windows component called afd.sys, which the security firm Automox describes as “the driver behind Windows socket connections on effectively every endpoint.”

“This isn’t a front-door bug,” Automox’s Landon Miles wrote in a Patch Tuesday blog post. “It’s step two in a chain: an attacker phishes their way into a low-privilege foothold, then uses the driver flaw to take the box. The 7.0 score reflects the high attack complexity, because race conditions are fiddly. The exploit has to be thrown over and over until the timing lands. Someone is clearly landing it anyway.”

CVE-2026-62832 is another privilege escalation flaw that Microsoft has labeled likely to be exploited; this flaw, in the Windows User Profile Service, may be related to the recent “LegacyHive” public disclosure from the prolific bug hunter known as Nightmare Eclipse. The other publicly disclosed flaw is CVE-2026-72971, a low-impact local tampering vulnerability that Microsoft reckons is unlikely to be exploited.

Other major software makers are likewise increasing their patch volumes and cadence thanks to AI, including Adobe which last month moved to twice-monthly security bulletins published on the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of each month. Cisco, Google, Mozilla and Oracle also are shipping updates far more frequently and abundantly.

By all accounts, AI is quite good at finding security holes in software. But for now at least, patching the resulting bugpocalypse remains a heavily human-centric endeavor, and the jury is still out on whether AI technologies will turn out to be as good at fixing vulnerabilities as they are at finding and exploiting them. This is an important question when one considers that these same AI technologies also are suggesting fixes for the vulnerabilities they find.

Researchers at 1Password recently examined what happens when different large language models (LLMs) generate vulnerability patches for newly disclosed, complex vulnerabilities. They found the LLMs produced patches that failed to fix the flaw or added a new weakness in the process (or both) more than half the time.

Ed Skoudis, president of the SANS Technology Institute, said his team has seen excellent results using AI to generate patches, provided there are humans in the loop to test the suggested fixes and push for iterative improvements.

“AI is rapidly becoming astonishingly good at finding vulnerabilities, but this research shows that fixing them is a very different problem,” Skoudis wrote in a SANS newsletter today. “Don’t expect one-shot AI patching to work reliably. Instead, iterate, test, challenge, improve, and verify. AI can be an extraordinary patching partner, but today it still needs a skilled human at the keyboard.”

Tyler Reguly at Fortra says while reports of Microsoft patching hundreds of vulnerabilities in one go have prompted some organizations to try to patch faster, it’s important to bear in mind that only one of the almost 400 bugs addressed today is known to be actively exploited. Reguly suggested security leaders check in with their teams to see how they’re handling the increasing workloads, which often involve testing fixes before deploying them in production environments.

“If you’re a chief security officer talk to your teams about how they are shifting or modifying their workflows to better accommodate the patching shift that we’re seeing and support them across various organizational units by enabling the changes they want to see made,” Reguly said. “There’s no need to rush these updates, no matter what various vendors and organizations try to tell you. You need to make sure that you are rolling out safe updates that will not negatively impact your systems.”

Speaking of the humans behind the keyboards, don’t neglect to backup your system and/or data before applying this month’s monster patch load. The day after each month’s Patch Tuesday is sometimes derisively referred to as Reboot Wednesday, but it generally doesn’t hurt to wait a few days to apply these huge update bundles because it sometimes takes a couple of days for the occasional misbehaving patch to get ironed out properly by Microsoft.

For a clickable, per-patch breakdown by severity and urgency, check out this roundup from the SANS Internet Storm Center.

Microsoft Corp. today released software updates to plug at least 570 security holes in its Windows operating systems and other software, almost triple the number of vulnerabilities the software giant fixed in its record-smashing Patch Tuesday release last month. Microsoft attributed the burgeoning patch counts to vulnerability discoveries aided by artificial intelligence.

Nearly 60 of the bugs quashed in July’s Patch Tuesday earned a “critical” severity rating, meaning miscreants or malware could use them to seize remote control over a Windows device with little or no help from the user. Microsoft also addressed three zero-day flaws, including two that are already being exploited in the wild.

Two of the zero-day weaknesses allow an attacker to elevate their user rights on a Windows system, as do approximately 250 other elevation of privilege flaws fixed this month; they include CVE-2026-56155 — an Active Directory Federation Services bug — and CVE-2026-56164, a Microsoft Sharepoint vulnerability.

CVE-2026-50661 is a security feature bypass in Windows BitLocker that could allow attackers to gain access to encrypted data if they have physical access to the device. Microsoft said this bug has been detailed publicly, but that it is not aware of any active exploitation.

In a blog post on July 9, Microsoft Executive Vice President Pavan Davuluri wrote that Windows users will notice “a higher volume of security updates included in each security release” as a result of AI aiding in the discovery of vulnerabilities.

“The pace of vulnerability discovery is changing with advances in AI making it possible to find more issues, faster, across more code, with new mechanisms that can accelerate both discovery and analysis,” Davuluri wrote.

Jack Bicer, director of vulnerability research at Action1, called attention to CVE-2026-48561, a remote code execution flaw in Microsoft Copilot (with a 9.6 CVSS threat score) that allows an unauthorized attacker to execute code over the network. Microsoft says an attacker could exploit this bug by hosting a malicious website that causes Microsoft Edge for Android to automatically send crafted prompts to Copilot when a user visits the site.

As AI advances the state of vulnerability discovery and remediation, it is also making it easier for attackers to quickly devise working exploits for known software flaws. Microsoft has long labeled security bugs using its “exploitability index,” which is Redmond’s best guess as to how likely it is that attackers will be able to figure out a reliable way to exploit a given vulnerability.

But Satnam Narang, senior staff research engineer at Tenable, argues that Microsoft’s exploitability index needs to do a better job of shifting with the machine speed of discovery. For example, Microsoft originally gave this month’s SharePoint zero-day an exploitability rating of “less likely,” although the flaw was added to CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities list on July 1.

“Anthropic’s Red Team’s own findings for known vulnerabilities (n-days) revealed how fragile this system has become, with its Mythos Preview model being able to produce proof-of-concept exploits for 13 of 14 vulnerabilities that were rated ‘Exploitation Less Likely’ or ‘Exploitation Unlikely,'” Narang said. “What this means is that our way of looking at Patch Tuesday has changed, because the exploitability index is centered around humans, not AI tools, and as these tools continue to improve, defense needs to improve alongside it.”

Chris Goettl at Ivanti observed that the record patch numbers from Microsoft come as a number of other major software makers are increasing their patch cadence, including Adobe which announced today it is moving to twice-monthly security bulletins published on the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of each month (Adobe also cited AI for accelerating their patch cycles). Cisco, Mozilla and Oracle also are shipping updates more frequently, while Google’s patch batches in June 2026 totaled more than 900 security fixes, Goettl noted.

Backing up your Windows system and/or data is always a good idea before applying operating system updates. Given the volume of patches addressed this month it may be wise for end users to wait a few days before applying these fixes. It’s not uncommon for security patches to introduce system stability issues, and those chances probably increase quite a bit with the gigantic patch count released today.

Further reading:

Action1’s Patch Tuesday blog

Automox’s rundown

Microsoft today released software updates to plug nearly 200 security holes across its Windows operating systems and supported software, a record number of fixes for the company’s monthly Patch Tuesday cycle. Nearly three dozen of those bugs earned Microsoft’s most dire “critical” rating, and exploit code for at least three of the weaknesses is now publicly available.

The software giant said in a blog post last month that both its engineers and the security community are increasing using artificial intelligence tools to find bugs, meaning this month’s heavy Patch Tuesday may start to become the norm, said Satnam Narang, senior staff research engineer at Tenable.

“Some surveys put AI usage among security professionals generally at 90%, so it’s unsurprising that this volume of patches may be the norm,” Narang said. “Pandora’s proverbial box has been opened, and as more advanced AI models become available, we expect the norm to continue upward across the board, not just for Patch Tuesday.”

June’s zero-day bugs include CVE-2026-49160, a denial of service vulnerability affecting a range of web servers, including Microsoft Internet Information Services (IIS). Microsoft says the flaw was reported by OpenAI’s Codex.

Two of the zero-days addressed this month appear to stem from recent vulnerability disclosures by Nightmare Eclipse, the nickname chosen by a security researcher who has been dropping exploits for various Windows flaws. One of those, dubbed “GreenPlasma,” leverages an elevation of privilege weakness in the Windows Collaborative Translation Framework, the same framework patched today in CVE-2026-45586.

Nightmare Eclipse also last month released “YellowKey,” an exploit for a Windows BitLocker vulnerability that allows an attacker with physical access to view encrypted data, and CVE-2026-50507 is a patch for an elevation of privilege bug in BitLocker.

Microsoft received heavy blowback on social media last month after it said in a blog post that it was considering taking legal action against the security researcher. The company later clarified on Twitter/X that while it has no intention of pursuing legal actions against researchers, it would report them to authorities if they break the law. The advisories for CVE-2026-49160 and CVE-2026-50507 do not credit any researchers in the acknowledgement section, saying only that “Microsoft recognizes the efforts of those in the security community who help us protect customers through coordinated vulnerability disclosure.”

Nightmare Eclipse claims to be a former employee of Microsoft, although Microsoft has not responded to questions about this claim. Rapid7 notes that a recent blog post by Nightmare Eclipse included an image of Albert Wesker, a character from the Resident Evil video game series who formerly worked as a researcher for a technology company before going rogue.

Nightmare Eclipse has pledged to release even more zero-day exploits for Windows in what they called a “bone shattering” drop planned for July 14 (the same day as next month’s Patch Tuesday). Immediately following the release of Microsoft patches today, the researcher published an exploit for what they claimed was a zero-day bug in Windows Defender.

While 200 vulnerabilities may be a record for Patch Tuesday, the actual number of security flaws Microsoft addressed this month is far higher, said Rapid7’s Adam Barnett.

“So far this month, Microsoft has provided patches to address 360 browser vulnerabilities, which is an order of magnitude more than has been typical in any given month over the past few years,” Barnett wrote. “As usual, browser [flaws] are not included in the Patch Tuesday count above. Indeed, the vast, and presumably sustained, uptick in the number of browser vulnerabilities has led to Microsoft no longer enumerating Chromium CVEs in the Security Update Guide.”

Microsoft also patched a zero-day vulnerability in Visual Studio Code that allows attackers to steal GitHub tokens with a single click. The company was forced to push a stopgap fix for the flaw on June 3, after a researcher published instructions showing how to exploit it. The researcher said they opted not to work with Microsoft because of a recent experience wherein Redmond silently patched a flaw they reported without offering credit or recognition.

Microsoft battled its own internal zero-day emergencies last week, after at least 72 of the company’s public code repositories were infected with a variant of the Shai-Hulud worm. Researchers found that all of the affected packages were connected to Microsoft official Azure Durable Task SDK, which got hit by the same Shai-Hulud worm in May.

Other major software makers are also shipping outsized update bundles this month. Adobe has released updates to fix a massive number of critical vulnerabilities across a range of products, including Adobe Experience Manager, Acrobat Reader and Cold Fusion. On June 3, Google resolved a whopping 429 vulnerabilities in its latest Chrome browser update (Chrome automatically downloads updates but installing them usually requires a complete restart of the browser).

As ever, please consider backing up your data before applying operating system updates, and drop a note in the comments if you run into any problems with this month’s patches.

Further reading:

Microsoft’s Security Update Guide

Action1’s Patch Tuesday breakdown

SANS Internet Storm Center notes on Patch Tuesday

When More Tools Create More Problems For years, organizations have approached cybersecurity with a simple mindset-add more tools to strengthen defenses. Firewalls, endpoint solutions, intrusion detection systems, and monitoring platforms have all been layered together to create what appears to be a comprehensive security posture. Yet, despite this growing investment, security outcomes have not improved

The post Why Traditional Security Tools Fail-and How Unified AI Platforms Solve the Problem appeared first on Seceon Inc.

The post Why Traditional Security Tools Fail-and How Unified AI Platforms Solve the Problem appeared first on Security Boulevard.

Build a layered security stack with identity network and device protection using MFA SSO VPN and endpoint tools to reduce cyber risks.

The post Building a Layered Security Stack: Identity, Network and Device Protection appeared first on Security Boulevard.

Microsoft Corp. today pushed security updates to fix at least 77 vulnerabilities in its Windows operating systems and other software. There are no pressing “zero-day” flaws this month (compared to February’s five zero-day treat), but as usual some patches may deserve more rapid attention from organizations using Windows. Here are a few highlights from this month’s Patch Tuesday.

Image: Shutterstock, @nwz.

Two of the bugs Microsoft patched today were publicly disclosed previously. CVE-2026-21262 is a weakness that allows an attacker to elevate their privileges on SQL Server 2016 and later editions.

“This isn’t just any elevation of privilege vulnerability, either; the advisory notes that an authorized attacker can elevate privileges to sysadmin over a network,” Rapid7’s Adam Barnett said. “The CVSS v3 base score of 8.8 is just below the threshold for critical severity, since low-level privileges are required. It would be a courageous defender who shrugged and deferred the patches for this one.”

The other publicly disclosed flaw is CVE-2026-26127, a vulnerability in applications running on .NET. Barnett said the immediate impact of exploitation is likely limited to denial of service by triggering a crash, with the potential for other types of attacks during a service reboot.

It would hardly be a proper Patch Tuesday without at least one critical Microsoft Office exploit, and this month doesn’t disappoint. CVE-2026-26113 and CVE-2026-26110 are both remote code execution flaws that can be triggered just by viewing a booby-trapped message in the Preview Pane.

Satnam Narang at Tenable notes that just over half (55%) of all Patch Tuesday CVEs this month are privilege escalation bugs, and of those, a half dozen were rated “exploitation more likely” — across Windows Graphics Component, Windows Accessibility Infrastructure, Windows Kernel, Windows SMB Server and Winlogon. These include:

–CVE-2026-24291: Incorrect permission assignments within the Windows Accessibility Infrastructure to reach SYSTEM (CVSS 7.8)
–CVE-2026-24294: Improper authentication in the core SMB component (CVSS 7.8)
–CVE-2026-24289: High-severity memory corruption and race condition flaw (CVSS 7.8)
–CVE-2026-25187: Winlogon process weakness discovered by Google Project Zero (CVSS 7.8).

Ben McCarthy, lead cyber security engineer at Immersive, called attention to CVE-2026-21536, a critical remote code execution bug in a component called the Microsoft Devices Pricing Program. Microsoft has already resolved the issue on their end, and fixing it requires no action on the part of Windows users. But McCarthy says it’s notable as one of the first vulnerabilities identified by an AI agent and officially recognized with a CVE attributed to the Windows operating system. It was discovered by XBOW, a fully autonomous AI penetration testing agent.

XBOW has consistently ranked at or near the top of the Hacker One bug bounty leaderboard for the past year. McCarthy said CVE-2026-21536 demonstrates how AI agents can identify critical 9.8-rated vulnerabilities without access to source code.

“Although Microsoft has already patched and mitigated the vulnerability, it highlights a shift toward AI-driven discovery of complex vulnerabilities at increasing speed,” McCarthy said. “This development suggests AI-assisted vulnerability research will play a growing role in the security landscape.”

Microsoft earlier provided patches to address nine browser vulnerabilities, which are not included in the Patch Tuesday count above. In addition, Microsoft issued a crucial out-of-band (emergency) update on March 2 for Windows Server 2022 to address a certificate renewal issue with passwordless authentication technology Windows Hello for Business.

Separately, Adobe shipped updates to fix 80 vulnerabilities — some of them critical in severity — in a variety of products, including Acrobat and Adobe Commerce. Mozilla Firefox v. 148.0.2 resolves three high severity CVEs.

For a complete breakdown of all the patches Microsoft released today, check out the SANS Internet Storm Center’s Patch Tuesday post. Windows enterprise admins who wish to stay abreast of any news about problematic updates, AskWoody.com is always worth a visit. Please feel free to drop a comment below if you experience any issues apply this month’s patches.

Microsoft today released updates to fix more than 50 security holes in its Windows operating systems and other software, including patches for a whopping six “zero-day” vulnerabilities that attackers are already exploiting in the wild.

Zero-day #1 this month is CVE-2026-21510, a security feature bypass vulnerability in Windows Shell wherein a single click on a malicious link can quietly bypass Windows protections and run attacker-controlled content without warning or consent dialogs. CVE-2026-21510 affects all currently supported versions of Windows.

The zero-day flaw CVE-2026-21513 is a security bypass bug targeting MSHTML, the proprietary engine of the default Web browser in Windows. CVE-2026-21514 is a related security feature bypass in Microsoft Word.

The zero-day CVE-2026-21533 allows local attackers to elevate their user privileges to “SYSTEM” level access in Windows Remote Desktop Services. CVE-2026-21519 is a zero-day elevation of privilege flaw in the Desktop Window Manager (DWM), a key component of Windows that organizes windows on a user’s screen. Microsoft fixed a different zero-day in DWM just last month.

The sixth zero-day is CVE-2026-21525, a potentially disruptive denial-of-service vulnerability in the Windows Remote Access Connection Manager, the service responsible for maintaining VPN connections to corporate networks.

Chris Goettl at Ivanti reminds us Microsoft has issued several out-of-band security updates since January’s Patch Tuesday. On January 17, Microsoft pushed a fix that resolved a credential prompt failure when attempting remote desktop or remote application connections. On January 26, Microsoft patched a zero-day security feature bypass vulnerability (CVE-2026-21509) in Microsoft Office.

Kev Breen at Immersive notes that this month’s Patch Tuesday includes several fixes for remote code execution vulnerabilities affecting GitHub Copilot and multiple integrated development environments (IDEs), including VS Code, Visual Studio, and JetBrains products. The relevant CVEs are CVE-2026-21516, CVE-2026-21523, and CVE-2026-21256.

Breen said the AI vulnerabilities Microsoft patched this month stem from a command injection flaw that can be triggered through prompt injection, or tricking the AI agent into doing something it shouldn’t — like executing malicious code or commands.

“Developers are high-value targets for threat actors, as they often have access to sensitive data such as API keys and secrets that function as keys to critical infrastructure, including privileged AWS or Azure API keys,” Breen said. “When organizations enable developers and automation pipelines to use LLMs and agentic AI, a malicious prompt can have significant impact. This does not mean organizations should stop using AI. It does mean developers should understand the risks, teams should clearly identify which systems and workflows have access to AI agents, and least-privilege principles should be applied to limit the blast radius if developer secrets are compromised.”

The SANS Internet Storm Center has a clickable breakdown of each individual fix this month from Microsoft, indexed by severity and CVSS score. Enterprise Windows admins involved in testing patches before rolling them out should keep an eye on askwoody.com, which often has the skinny on wonky updates. Please don’t neglect to back up your data if it has been a while since you’ve done that, and feel free to sound off in the comments if you experience problems installing any of these fixes.

Developing a robust Incident Response (IR) strategy is vital for minimizing risks and damage during cyberattacks. Learn how to create an effective IR plan, the six phases of incident response, and the importance of assembling a skilled IR team with the right tools to ensure swift recovery and protection."

The post Building an Effective Incident Response Strategy to Combat Cyberattacks  appeared first on Security Boulevard.

Imagine this: You’re sipping your morning coffee and scrolling through your emails, when you spot it—a vulnerability report for your open source project. It’s your first one. Panic sets in. What does this mean? Where do you even start?

Many maintainers face this moment without a clear roadmap, but the good news is that handling vulnerability reports doesn’t have to be stressful. Below, we’ll show you that with the right tools and a step-by-step approach, you can tackle security issues efficiently and confidently.

Let’s dig in.

What is vulnerability disclosure?

If you discovered that the lock on your front door was faulty, would you attach a note announcing it to everyone passing by? Of course not! Instead, you’d quietly tell the people who need to know—your family or housemates—so you can fix it before it becomes a real safety risk.

That’s exactly how vulnerability disclosure should be handled. Security issues aren’t just another bug. They can be a blueprint for attackers if exposed too soon. Instead of discussing them in the open, maintainers should work with security researchers behind the scenes to fix problems before they become public.

This approach, known as Coordinated Vulnerability Disclosure (CVD), keeps your users safe while giving you time to resolve the issue properly.

To support maintainers in this process, GitHub provides tools like Private Vulnerability Reporting (PVR), draft security advisories, and Dependabot alerts. These tools are free to use for open source projects, and are designed to make managing vulnerabilities straightforward and effective.

Let’s walk through how to handle vulnerability reports, so that the next time one lands in your inbox, you’ll know exactly what to do!

The vulnerability disclosure process, at a glance

Here’s a quick overview of what you should do if you receive a vulnerability report:

1. Enable Private Vulnerability Reporting (PVR) to handle submissions securely.
2. Collaborate on a fix: Use draft advisories to plan and test resolutions privately.
3. Request a Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) identifier: Learn how to assign a CVE to your advisory for broader visibility.
4. Publish the advisory: Notify your community about the issue and the fix.
5. Notify and protect users: Utilize tools like Dependabot for automated updates.

Now, let’s break down each step.

1. Start securely with PVR

Here’s the thing: There are security researchers out there actively looking for vulnerabilities in open source projects and trying to help. But if they don’t know who to report the problem to, it’s hard to resolve it. They could post the issue publicly, but this could expose users to attacks before there’s a fix. They could send it to the wrong person and delay the response. Or they could give up and move on.

The best way to ensure these researchers can reach you easily and safely is to turn on GitHub’s Private Vulnerability Reporting (PVR).

Think of PVR as a private inbox for security issues. It provides a built-in, confidential way for security researchers to report vulnerabilities directly in your repository.

🔗 How to enable PVR for a repository or an organization.

Heads up! By default, maintainers don’t receive notifications for new PVR reports, so be sure to update your notification settings so nothing slips through the cracks.

Enhance PVR with a SECURITY.md file

PVR solves the “where” and the “how” of reporting security issues. But what if you want to set clear expectations from the start? That’s where a SECURITY.md file comes in handy.

PVR is your front door, and SECURITY.md is your welcome guide telling visitors what to do when they arrive. Without it, researchers might not know what’s in scope, what details you need, or whether their report will be reviewed.

Maintainers are constantly bombarded with requests, making triage difficult—especially if reports are vague or missing key details. A well-crafted SECURITY.md helps cut through the noise by defining expectations early. It reassures researchers that their contributions are valued while giving them a clear framework to follow.

A good SECURITY.md file includes:

• How to report vulnerabilities (ex: “Please submit reports through PVR.”)
• What information should be included in a report (e.g., steps to reproduce, affected versions, etc.)

Pairing PVR with a clear SECURITY.md file helps you streamline incoming reports more effectively, making it easier for researchers to submit useful details and for you to act on them efficiently.

2. Collaborate on a fix: Draft security advisories

Once you confirm the issue is a valid vulnerability, the next step is fixing it without tipping off the wrong people.

But where do you discuss the details? You can’t just drop a fix in a public pull request and hope no one notices. If attackers spot the change before the fix is officially released, they can exploit it before users can update.

What you’ll need is a private space where you and your collaborators can investigate the issue, work on and test a fix, and then coordinate its release.

GitHub provides that space with draft security advisories. Think of them like a private fork, but specifically for security fixes.

Why use draft security advisories?

• They keep your discussion private, so that you can work privately with your team or trusted contributors without alerting bad actors.
• They centralize everything, so your discussions, patches, and plans are kept in a secure workspace.
• They’re ready for publishing when you are: You can convert your draft advisory into a public advisory whenever you’re ready.

🔗 How to create a draft advisory.

By using draft security advisories, you take control of the disclosure timeline, ensuring security issues are fixed before they become public knowledge.

3. Request a CVE with GitHub

Some vulnerabilities are minor contained issues that can be patched quietly. Others have a broader impact and need to be tracked across the industry.

When a vulnerability needs broader visibility, a Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures (CVE) identifier provides a standardized way to document and reference it. GitHub allows maintainers to request a CVE directly from their draft security advisory, making the process seamless.

What is a CVE, and why does it matter?

A CVE is like a serial number for a security vulnerability. It provides an industry-recognized reference so that developers, security teams, and automated tools can consistently track and respond to vulnerabilities.

Why would you request a CVE?

• For maintainers, it helps ensure a vulnerability is adequately documented and recognized in security databases.
• For security researchers, it provides validation that their findings have been acknowledged and recorded.

CVEs are used in security reports, alerts, feeds, and automated security tools. This helps standardize communication between projects, security teams, and end users.

Requesting a CVE doesn’t make a vulnerability more or less critical, but it does help ensure that those affected can track and mitigate risks effectively.

🔗 How to request a CVE.

Once assigned, the CVE is linked to your advisory but will remain private until you publish it.

By requesting a CVE when appropriate, you’re helping improve visibility and coordination across the industry.

4. Publish the advisory

Good job! You’ve fixed the vulnerability. Now, it’s time to let your users know about it. A security advisory does more than just announce an issue. It guides your users on what to do next.

What is a security advisory, and why does it matter?

A security advisory is like a press release for an important update. It’s not just about disclosing a problem, it’s about ensuring your users know exactly what’s happening, why it matters, and what they need to do.

A clear and well-written advisory helps to:

• Inform users: Clearly explain the issue and provide instructions for fixing it.
• Build trust: Demonstrate accountability and transparency by addressing vulnerabilities proactively.
• Trigger automated notifications: Tools, like GitHub Dependabot, use advisories to alert developers with affected dependencies.

🔗 How to publish a security advisory.

Once published, the advisory becomes public in your repository and includes details about the vulnerability and how to fix it.

Best practices for writing an advisory

• Use plain language: Write in a way that’s easy to understand for both developers and non-technical users
• Include essential details:
  • A description of the vulnerability and its impact
  • Versions affected by the issue
  • Steps to update, patch, or mitigate the risk
• Provide helpful resources:
  • Links to patched versions or updated dependencies
  • Workarounds for users who can’t immediately apply the fix
  • Additional documentation or best practices

📌 Check out this advisory for a well-structured reference.

A well-crafted security advisory is not just a formality. It’s a roadmap that helps your users stay secure. Just as a company would carefully craft a press release for a significant change, your advisory should be clear, reassuring, and actionable. By making security easier to understand, you empower your users to protect themselves and keep their projects safe.

5. After publication: Notify and protect users

Publishing your security advisory isn’t the finish line. It’s the start of helping your users stay protected. Even the best advisory is only effective if the right people see it and take action.

Beyond publishing the advisory, consider:

• Announcing it through your usual channels: Blog posts, mailing lists, release notes, and community forums help reach users who may not rely on automated alerts.
• Documenting it for future users: Someone might adopt your project later without realizing a past version had a security issue. Keep advisories accessible and well-documented.

You should also take advantage of GitHub tools, including:

• Dependabot alerts
  • Automatically informs developers using affected dependencies
  • Encourages updates by suggesting patched versions
• Proactive prevention
  • Use scanning tools to find similar problems in different parts of your project. If you find a problem in one area, it might also exist elsewhere
  • Regularly review and update your project’s dependencies to avoid known issues
• CVE publication and advisory database
• If you requested a CVE, GitHub will publish the CVE record to CVE.org for industry-wide tracking
• If eligible, your advisory will also be added to the GitHub Advisory Database, improving visibility for security researchers and developers

Whether through automated alerts or direct communication, making your advisory visible is key to keeping your project and its users secure.

Next report? You’re ready!

With the right tools and a clear approach, handling vulnerabilities isn’t just manageable—it’s part of running a strong, secure project. So next time a report comes in, take a deep breath. You’ve got this!

FAQ: Common questions from maintainers

You’ve got questions? We got answers! Whether you’re handling your first vulnerability report or just want to sharpen your response process, here is what you need to know.

1. Why is Private Vulnerability Reporting (PVR) better than emails or public issues for vulnerability reports?
Great question! At first glance, email or public issue tracking might seem like simple ways to handle vulnerability reports. But PVR is a better choice because it:

• Keeps things private and secure: PVR ensures that sensitive details stay confidential. No risk of accidental leaks, and no need to juggle security concerns over email.
• Keeps everything in one place: No more scattered emails or external tools. Everything—discussions, reports, and updates—is neatly stored right in your repository.
• Makes it easier for researchers: PVR gives researchers a dedicated, structured way to report issues without jumping through hoops.

Bottom line? PVR makes life easier for both maintainers and researchers while keeping security under control.

2. What steps should I take if I receive a vulnerability report that I believe is a false positive?
Not every report is a real security issue, but it’s always worth taking a careful look before dismissing it.

• Double-check details: Sometimes, what seems like a false alarm might be misunderstood. Review the details thoroughly.
• Ask for more information: Ask clarifying questions or request additional details through GitHub’s PVR. Many researchers are happy to provide further context.
• Check with others: If you’re unsure, bring in a team member or a security-savvy friend to help validate the report.
• Close the loop: If it is a false positive, document your reasoning in the PVR thread. Transparency keeps things professional and builds trust with the researcher.

3. How fast do I need to respond?
* Acknowledge ASAP: Even if you don’t have a fix yet, let the researcher know you got their report. A simple “Thanks, we’re looking into it” goes a long way.
* Follow the 90-day best practice: While there’s no hard rule, most security pros aim to address verified vulnerabilities within 90 days.
* Prioritize by severity: Use the Common Vulnerability Scoring System (CVSS) to gauge urgency and decide what to tackle first.

Think of it this way: No one likes being left in the dark. A quick update keeps researchers engaged and makes collaboration smoother.

4. How do I figure out the severity of a reported vulnerability?
Severity can be tricky, but don’t stress! There are tools and approaches that make it easier.

• Use the CVSS calculator: It gives you a structured way to evaluate the impact and exploitability of a vulnerability.
• Consider real-world impact: A vulnerability that requires special conditions to exploit might be lower risk, while one that can be triggered easily by any user could be more severe.
• Collaborate with the reporter: They might have insights on how the issue could be exploited in real-world scenarios.

Take it step by step—it’s better to get it right than to rush.

5. Should I request a CVE before or after publishing an advisory?
There’s no one-size-fits-all answer, but here’s a simple way to decide:

• If it’s urgent: Publish the advisory first, then request a CVE. CVE assignments can take 1–3 days, and you don’t want to delay the fix.
• For less urgent cases: Request a CVE beforehand to ensure it’s included in Dependabot alerts from the start.

Either way, your advisory gets published, and your users stay informed.

6. Where can I learn more about managing vulnerabilities and security practices?
There’s no need to figure everything out on your own. These resources can help:

• GitHub security documentation: Get detailed guidance on repository security advisories.
• Open Source Security Foundation (OpenSSF): Join the open source security community to learn from others.

Security is an ongoing journey, and every step you take makes your projects stronger. Keep learning, stay proactive, and you’ll be in great shape.

Next steps

• Turn on private vulnerability reporting today and make it easy for researchers to report security issues.
• Learn more about GitHub Security Advisories and how they can streamline your process.
• Explore coordinated vulnerability disclosure and build a security-first approach for your project.

By taking these steps, you’re protecting your project and contributing to a safer and more secure open source ecosystem.

The post A maintainer’s guide to vulnerability disclosure: GitHub tools to make it simple appeared first on The GitHub Blog.