Greetings; (blind copied to a broad SCA community, and several lists --
apologies for duplication)
A serious vulnerability in Adobe's Acrobat and Acrobat Reader applications
has been identified which permits malicious JavaScript (a programming
language) code stored in common PDF files to be unwittingly executed by the
reader, exposing their computing platform to infection and third-party
control.
A great deal of documentation and many publications on the internet are
distributed in PDF format these days. As active exploits of this
vulnerability are currently being detected across the global internet, I am
HIGHLY recommending that all users of these products perform the following
steps to protect themselves from inadvertent malware attacks based on this
risk factor. Further, I strongly recommend you leave this setting this way
until Adobe publishes a patch/fix for this serious vulnerability.
Recommended Setting Changes:
If you are running either of these applications (Adobe Acrobat, or Adobe
Acrobat Reader) start up the application (by itself, not by opening an
actual PDF file). Then, go to the 'EDIT' menu and select 'PREFERENCES'
there, go down the list on the left hand side and find and click on
'JAVASCRIPT'
'Enable Acrobat JavaScript', which you should uncheck to disable JavaScript
in Acrobat. Then select OK, then close the window. While this setting change
may diminish some functionality of some PDF files, this is the only change
known to mitigate this serious risk.
Please feel free to distribute this liberally, with due care against
spamming.
Yours in service,
-- Grimkirk
Province of Tre-Girt-Sea, Middle Kingdom
(Chicago, IL)
John M. Schneider, M.Sc. CINS, CISSPR, ITILv3
Information Assurance Officer
U.S. Navy / Naval Education Training Command / NSTC N63
Great Lakes Naval Station
Great Lakes, IL 60088
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