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A security researcher has disclosed details of an important vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook for which the company released an incomplete patch this month—almost 18 months after receiving the responsible disclosure report.

The Microsoft Outlook vulnerability (CVE-2018-0950) could allow attackers to steal sensitive information, including users’ Windows login credentials, just by convincing victims to preview an email with Microsoft Outlook, without requiring any additional user interaction.

The vulnerability, discovered by Will Dormann of the CERT Coordination Center (CERT/CC), resides in the way Microsoft Outlook renders remotely-hosted OLE content when an RTF (Rich Text Format) email message is previewed and automatically initiates SMB connections.

A remote attacker can exploit this vulnerability by sending an RTF email to a target victim, containing a remotely-hosted image file (OLE object), loading from the attacker-controlled SMB server.

Windows users, especially network administrators  are advised to follow the below-mentioned steps to mitigate this vulnerability.

• Apply the Microsoft update for CVE-2018-0950, if you have not yet.
• Block NT LAN Manager (NTLM) Single Sign-on (SSO) authentication.
• Most important, don’t click on suspicious links provided in emails.