August 2023 Patch Tuesday Updates are Now Available on Windows 11 and Windows 10

Microsoft has released today the August 2023 Patch Tuesday updates for Windows 11 and Windows 10. This month, Microsoft fixed 86 vulnerabilities in Windows, Office, and other components, and you can also expect the usual bug fixes and quality improvements.

After the July Patch Tuesday update for Windows 11 version 22H2 enabled the new “Moment 3” features on the latest version of Windows, we’ll likely need to wait until Windows 11 version 23H2 ships later this fall to see new features come to the OS. Microsoft already announced that the next annual update for Windows 11 will be released as an enablement package, which should guarantee a seamless update process for organizations

August 2023 Patch Tuesday updates fix over 80 vulnerabilities

As pointed out by the Zero Day Initiative, Microsoft released a total of 86 patches today, with fixes for six critical vulnerabilities. None of them are already being exploited by attackers, however. 

Here are the most important vulnerabilities you should know about this month:

• CVE-2023-35385/36910/36911: These three Microsoft Message Queuing Remote Code Execution vulnerabilities could allow unauthenticated attackers to remotely execute code on the target server. However, the Windows message queuing service needs to be enabled to make systems vulnerable, and this feature can be enabled from the Control Panel. 

• CVE-2023-29328/29330: These two Microsoft Teams Remote Code Execution vulnerabilities require attackers to trick victims into joining a Teams meeting which would enable them to perform remote code execution.

• CVE-2023-21709: This Microsoft Exchange Server Elevation of Privilege vulnerability could allow attackers in a network-based attack to brute force user account passwords to log in as other users.

Here’s the full list of CVEs Microsoft released this month:

Quality and experience updates

For users running Windows 11 version 22H2, today’s KB5029263 patch includes the following quality improvements:

• Brightness settings should be more accurate
• Microsoft fixed an issue causing certain display and audio devices to go missing after systems resume from sleep.
• Users connecting to the Internet via VPN on a wireless mesh network should no longer experience poor network performance. 
• A bug causing widgets to unexpectedly unpin from the taskbar has also been fixed. 

For Windows 10 users, the KB5029244 update is now available on the versions 21H2 and 22H2 of the OS. It includes the following improvements:

• Microsoft fixed an issue causing certain display and audio devices to go missing after systems resume from sleep.
• Microsoft addressed an issue causing some VPN clients to fail to establish a connection.
• Users should no longer have an issue with the Search app opening in full screen and blocking additional Start Menu actions. 
• Microsoft has also fixed an issue affecting hybrid joined devices with Windows Hello for Business PIN or biometric credentials. Users could not sign in to them if they were not connected to the internet. 

Windows Update testing and best practices

Organizations looking to deploy this month’s patches should conduct thorough testing before deploying them widely on production systems. That said, applying the patches widely shouldn’t be delayed longer than necessary as hackers start to work out how to weaponize newly reported vulnerabilities.

A best practice is to make sure you have backed up systems before applying updates. Every month, users experience issues with Windows updates that lead to systems not booting, application and hardware compatibility issues, or even data loss in extreme cases.

There are backup tools built into Windows and Windows Server that you can use to restore systems in the event a patch causes a problem. The backup features in Windows can be used to restore an entire system, or files and folders on a granular basis.

If you have any problems with this month’s patches, please let us know in the comments below. Other readers might be able to share their experiences in how to roll back problematic updates or mitigate issues caused by patches that are important to have in place.