Internet Explorer Spoofing Vulnerability

An spoofing vulnerability exists when Internet Explorer improperly handles URLs. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could trick a user by redirecting the user to a specially crafted website. The specially crafted website could either spoof content or serve as a pivot to chain an attack with other vulnerabilities in web services.

To exploit the vulnerability, the user must click a specially crafted URL. In an email attack scenario, an attacker could send an email message containing the specially crafted URL to the user in an attempt to convince the user to click it.

In a web-based attack scenario, an attacker could host a specially crafted website designed to appear as a legitimate website to the user. However, the attacker would have no way to force the user to visit the specially crafted website. The attacker would have to convince the user to visit the specially crafted website, typically by way of enticement in an email or instant message, and then convince the user to interact with content on the website.

The security update addresses the vulnerability by changing how URLs are handled by Internet Explorer.