Office 2009 converter

What should I do? The affected software listed in this bulletin have been tested to determine which releases are affected. Other releases are past their support life cycle. For more information about the product lifecycle, visit the Microsoft Support Lifecycle Web site.

It should be a priority for customers who have older releases of the software to migrate to supported releases to prevent potential exposure to vulnerabilities. To determine the support lifecycle for your software release, see Select a Product for Lifecycle Information. For more information about service packs for these software releases, see Lifecycle Supported Service Packs. Customers who require custom support for older software must contact their Microsoft account team representative, their Technical Account Manager, or the appropriate Microsoft partner representative for custom support options.

Customers without an Alliance, Premier, or Authorized Contract can contact their local Microsoft sales office. For contact information, visit the Microsoft Worldwide Information Web site, select the country in the Contact Information list, and then click Go to see a list of telephone numbers. When you call, ask to speak with the local Premier Support sales manager. The following severity ratings assume the potential maximum impact of the vulnerability.

For information regarding the likelihood, within 30 days of this security bulletin's release, of the exploitability of the vulnerability in relation to its severity rating and security impact, please see the Exploitability Index in the December bulletin summary. For more information, see Microsoft Exploitability Index. A remote code execution vulnerability exists in the way that text converters in Microsoft WordPad and Microsoft Office process memory when a user opens a specially crafted Word 97 file.

Mitigation refers to a setting, common configuration, or general best-practice, existing in a default state, that could reduce the severity of exploitation of a vulnerability. The following mitigating factors may be helpful in your situation:. Workaround refers to a setting or configuration change that does not correct the underlying vulnerability but would help block known attack vectors before you apply the update.

Microsoft has tested the following workarounds and states in the discussion whether a workaround reduces functionality. Disable the WordPad text converter for Word 97 by restricting access to the converter file. Depending on your operating system version and your history of operating system upgrades and service packs, some of the files referenced below may not exist.

Impact of workaround. When opening a Word 97 document in WordPad, it will show the binary data instead of the formatted text. How to undo the workaround. Run the following commands from an administrator command prompt. Depending on your operating system version and your history of operating system upgrades and service packs, some of the file referenced below may not exist. What is the scope of the vulnerability? This is a remote code execution vulnerability. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system remotely.

An attacker could then install programs or view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. What causes the vulnerability? The vulnerability results from the way that the text converter for Word 97 included as part of WordPad and as part of the Office text converters parses a specially crafted Word 97 document. WordPad is a default component of Microsoft Windows operating systems. These text converters also allow users to save documents in the Word 6.

Text converters are also a default component of Microsoft Office that allow users to open and save as older Office file formats, including the Word 6. What might an attacker use the vulnerability to do? An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could run arbitrary code as the logged-on user. If a user is logged on with administrative user rights, an attacker could take complete control of the affected system. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.

Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights. How could an attacker exploit the vulnerability? This vulnerability requires that a user open a specially crafted document with an affected version of WordPad or Microsoft Office. In an e-mail attack scenario, an attacker could exploit the vulnerability by sending a specially crafted file to the user and by convincing the user to open the file using either WordPad or Microsoft Office.

In a Web-based attack scenario, an attacker would have to host a Web site that contains a document that is used to attempt to exploit this vulnerability.

In addition, compromised Web sites and Web sites that accept or host user-provided content could contain specially crafted content that could exploit this vulnerability. An attacker would have no way to force users to visit a specially crafted Web site.

Instead, an attacker would have to convince them to visit the Web site, typically by getting them to click a link that takes them to the attacker's site. What systems are primarily at risk from the vulnerability?

Systems, such as workstations and terminal servers, with WordPad or Microsoft Office installed where documents are opened from untrusted sources are primarily at risk.

Servers could be at more risk if administrators allow users to log on to servers and to run programs. However, best practices strongly discourage allowing this. What does the update do? This update addresses the vulnerability by correcting the way that WordPad and the Office Text Converters parse Word 97 documents. When this security bulletin was issued, had this vulnerability been publicly disclosed? Microsoft received information about this vulnerability through responsible disclosure.

When this security bulletin was issued, had Microsoft received any reports that this vulnerability was being exploited? Type a new name for the document in the File name box, and click Word Document in the Save as type list. Click the File tab. Do one of the following: To convert the document without saving a copy, click Info , and then click Convert. When you open a document in Word , it is in one of two modes: Word Word Compatibility Mode If you are in Word Compatibility Mode, the words Compatibility Mode appear in the document's title bar, after the file name.

Converting your document lets you access the new and enhanced features in Word Need more help? Expand your skills. Get new features first. Was this information helpful? Yes No. Thank you! Any more feedback? The more you tell us the more we can help.

Can you help us improve? Resolved my issue. Clear instructions. People also like. Office Free. QR Scanner Plus Free. C Lite Browser Free. Flash Browser Free. Features Unlimited offline conversions of all supported formats. Needs just a few seconds to convert your document. Additional information Published by Yellow Elephant Productions.

Published by Yellow Elephant Productions. Approximate size KB. Age rating For all ages. This app can Access your Internet connection. Permissions info. Installation Get this app while signed in to your Microsoft account and install on up to ten Windows 10 devices.