#Windows MSHTML Platform

**What kind of security feature could be bypassed by successfully exploiting this vulnerability?** This vulnerability bypasses OLE mitigations in Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Office which protect users from vulnerable COM/OLE controls.

**Is the Preview Pane an attack vector for this vulnerability?** The attacker could exploit this vulnerability by sending a specially crafted email which triggers automatically when it is retrieved and processed by the Outlook client. This could lead to exploitation BEFORE the email is viewed in the Preview Pane.

**According to the CVSS metric, user interaction is required (UI:R). What interaction would the user have to do?** Exploitation of the vulnerability requires that a user open a specially crafted file. * In an email attack scenario, an attacker could exploit the vulnerability by sending the specially crafted file to the user and convincing the user to open the file. * In a web-based attack scenario, an attacker could host a website (or leverage a compromised website that accepts or hosts user-provided content) containing a specially crafted file designed to exploit the vulnerability. An attacker would have no way to force users to visit the website. Instead, an attacker would have to convince users to click a link, typically by way of an enticement in an email or instant message, and then convince them to open the specially crafted file.

**According to the CVSS metric, user interaction is required (UI:R). What interaction would the user have to do?** An attacker must send the user a malicious file and convince them to open it.

**What kind of security feature could be bypassed by successfully exploiting this vulnerability?** A security feature bypass vulnerability exists when the MSHTML platform fails to validate the correct Security Zone of requests for specific URLs. This could allow an attacker to cause a user to access a URL in a less restricted Internet Security Zone than intended. To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker could email or otherwise provide a specially crafted URL to a victim and convince them to click on it. The security update addresses the vulnerability by correcting security feature behavior to properly map affected URLs to the correct Security Zone.

**According to the CVSS metric, user interaction is required (UI:R). What interaction would the user have to do?** An attacker must send the user a malicious file and convince them to open it.

**What kind of security feature could be bypassed by successfully exploiting this vulnerability?** A security feature bypass vulnerability exists when the MSHTML platform fails to validate the correct Security Zone of requests for specific URLs. This could allow an attacker to cause a user to access a URL in a less restricted Internet Security Zone than intended. To exploit this vulnerability, an attacker could email or otherwise provide a specially crafted URL to a victim and convince them to click on it. The security update addresses the vulnerability by correcting security feature behavior to properly map affected URLs to the correct Security Zone.

**According to the CVSS metric, user interaction is required (UI:R). What interaction would the user have to do?** Exploitation of the vulnerability requires that a user open a specially crafted file. * In an email attack scenario, an attacker could exploit the vulnerability by sending the specially crafted file to the user and convincing the user to open the file. * In a web-based attack scenario, an attacker could host a website (or leverage a compromised website that accepts or hosts user-provided content) containing a specially crafted file designed to exploit the vulnerability. An attacker would have no way to force users to visit the website. Instead, an attacker would have to convince users to click a link, typically by way of an enticement in an email or instant message, and then convince them to open the specially crafted file.

**According to the CVSS metric, successful exploitation of this vulnerability could lead to some loss of integrity (I:L) and some loss of availability (A:L). What does that mean for this vulnerability?** An attacker can craft a malicious URL that would evade zone checks, resulting in a limited loss of integrity and availability of the victim machine.

**According to the CVSS metric, the attack vector is local (AV:L). Why does the CVE title indicate that this is a remote code execution?** The word **Remote** in the title refers to the location of the attacker. This type of exploit is sometimes referred to as Arbitrary Code Execution (ACE). The attack itself is carried out locally. For example, when the score indicates that the **Attack Vector** is **Local** and **User Interaction** is **Required**, this could describe an exploit in which an attacker, through social engineering, convinces a victim to download and open a specially crafted file from a website which leads to a local attack on their computer.