We provided the following to our GUARDIAN Support Clients on Friday:
Earlier this week the existence of two CPU related security vulnerabilities was released to the general public. These vulnerabilities affect most modern computing device processors (including Intel and AMD), and allow an unauthorized process access to privileged system memory.
There are currently no known active exploits of these vulnerabilities.
Microsoft has released a Security Only Update on January 3, 2018 to address this vulnerability for Windows devices. This patch has a known compatibility issue with most antivirus programs. If this patch is applied prior to pending updates by your antivirus vendor, your computer will not boot.
On January 9th Microsoft will be releasing their Monthly Security Patch Rollup, which contains the same patch, but will automatically detect if your antivirus software has been updated to be compatible.
Actions and plans:
GUARDIAN Support clients will only need ensure your computers are left online during their normal patch cycle. Patches will automatically be deployed, in the correct order, over the next few days.
If you have any questions or specific concerns, please contact us.
Thank you for your business!