Microsoft Readies Patches For Windows, Visual StudioMicrosoft Readies Patches For Windows, Visual Studio

Microsoft's upcoming monthly security patch release for September is expected to include five bulletins -- one critical and four rated important.

In its monthly Security Bulletin Advance Notification, Microsoft announced how many security updates or bulletins will be released the next week, but does not go so far as to say how many vulnerabilities will be patched. This month's scheduled Patch Tuesday will come on Sept. 11.

Only one of the five bulletins this month garnered a critical rating. The flaw, which applies to the Microsoft Windows operating system, is caused by a remote code execution. Critical is Microsoft's highest security rating.

The four other bulletins all are rated as important, which is the company's second highest rating.

One bulletin focuses on another remote code execution bug -- this one affecting MSN Messenger 6.2, MSN Messenger 7.0, MSN Messenger 7.5 and Windows Live Messenger 8.0.

Another bulletin deals with a remote code execution flaw in Visual Studio. The advance notification alert also noted that one of the bulletins will deal with Windows Vista.

The slated five bulletins will come out the month after Microsoft issued a mega batch of patches. August saw the second largest patch release this year with researchers saying they affected anyone using Windows. Last month, Microsoft released nine security bulletins, fixing a total of 14 vulnerabilities. Eight of the bugs were critical; four were rated important, and two were rated moderate. The fixes addressed flaws in Windows, Windows Media Player, Windows Gadgets, Office, Excel, Internet Explorer, Visual Basic, Virtual Sever, and Virtual PC.