Security News
The new update is being released as an optional cumulative preview update that can be manually installed by opening Settings > Windows Update and clicking the 'Check for updates' button. Due to this less frequent update cycle, Microsoft introduced a new update process for Windows 11 that allows new features to be released more frequently.
Microsoft announced today an early preview of Phone Link for iPhone users available to Windows Insiders running the latest Windows 11 builds. "The preview will begin rolling out to Insiders who have opted in their device into one of the 3 Insider Channels via Settings > Windows Update > Windows Insider Program," Microsoft Senior Program Manager Brandon LeBlanc said.
Microsoft has addressed a known issue behind unsupported computers being offered Windows 11 22H2 upgrades and unable to complete the installation process. This has happened before, with Windows 11 22H2 being offered to Windows 11 Insiders in the Release Preview channel with ineligible devices.
The PlugX remote access trojan has been observed masquerading as an open source Windows debugger tool called x64dbg in an attempt to circumvent security protections and gain control of a target system. "This file is a legitimate open-source debugger tool for Windows that is generally used to examine kernel-mode and user-mode code, crash dumps, or CPU registers," Trend Micro researchers Buddy Tancio, Jed Valderama, and Catherine Loveria said in a report published last week.
Microsoft's open-source PowerToys tool is a great way to customize your Windows experience. Thanks to work done by the community, PowerToys is getting a new feature - the ability to paste text as plain text.
Threat actors are exploiting the popularity of OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot to distribute malware for Windows and Android, or direct unsuspecting vitims to phishing pages. Security researcher Dominic Alvieri was among the first to notice one such example using the domain "Chat-gpt-pc.online" to infect visitors with the Redline info-stealing malware under the guise of a download for a ChatGPT Windows desktop client.
Microsoft has released the February 2023 optional cumulative updates for all editions of Windows 11 22H2 and all supported Windows 10 versions. The KB5022905 Windows 11 non-security release comes with 13 bug fixes and enhancements, including an advanced auto-learning feature for facial recognition and fixing an IE mode issue where the text on the status bar is not always visible.
VMware has released a vSphere ESXi update that addresses a known issue causing some Windows Server 2022 virtual machines to no longer boot after installing this month's KB5022842 update. Microsoft first acknowledged the issue on Thursday when the company said it only impacts VMs with Secure Boot enabled and running on vSphere ESXi 6.7 U2/U3 or vSphere ESXi 7.0.x. Although Redmond says that only VMware ESXi VMs are affected, some Windows admin reports hint at other hypervisor platforms being impacted by similar boot problems after deploying this month's updates.
Microsoft will soon add a new way to end unresponsive processes in Windows 11 in the form of a new option that will show up when right-clicking an app's taskbar icon. The new functionality is currently in development as a hidden feature of Windows 11 build 25300 in the Windows Insider developer channel.
Microsoft is sorting through two issues with Windows Server 2022 that affect VMware virtual machines and updates not getting passed on to Windows 11 devices. Both problems are related to the KB5022842 security update to Windows Server 2022 rolled out February 14 and will spread their share of headaches to users.