Uninstall Apple’s QuickTime for Windows immediately, says US Government

In case you are still using Apple’s media player, QuickTime for your Windows PC then it is time to get rid of it “immediately”. Apple has ended support for QuickTime for Windows, and will no longer be providing security updates and fixes, leaving the application vulnerable to exploitation.

The advisory for uninstalling Quick Time for Windows has come from U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) and antivirus firm Trend Micro. Trend Micro has in fact issued an “Urgent Call to Action” asking Windows users to get rid of this software.

Users must note that above warning does not apply to QuickTime on Mac OSX. The support has ended for Windows.

Trend Micro finds critical flaws in QuickTime for Windows

Trend Micro has found two critical flaws in the PC version of Quick Time for Windows that could lead to hackers gaining control over the victim’s PC. Here are the 2 flaws in detail.

Threat# 1

With Apple withdrawing support for QuickTime for Windows, there will no security updates and warning reaching to the users. This may result in risks from viruses and other security threats leading to serious consequences including loss and theft of personal data.

Threat#2

Trend Micro describes that under this threat remote attackers are able to execute arbitrary code on vulnerable installations of Apple QuickTime. User interaction is required to exploit this vulnerability and the target must visit a malicious page or open a malicious file.

Attackers can employ below tricks to target user machine:

• When the specific flaw exists within the moov atom. By specifying an invalid value for a field within the moov atom, an attacker can write data outside of an allocated heap buffer. Having done that, the attacker can now leverage this to execute arbitrary code under the context of the QuickTime player.
• When the specific flaw exists within atom processing. By providing an invalid index, an attacker can write data outside of an allocated heap buffer. Using this the attacker can now leverage this to execute arbitrary code under the context of the QuickTime player.

For those who use QuickTime for Windows PC, uninstalling the program is the only solution to avoid this vulnerability.

The Trend Micro Urgent Call to Action is available here.