Further Patches for OS X

By Dave Nixon

Apple has released an additional set of Mac OS X bug fixes. The most recent security updates fix 11 bugs in the Mac Operating system, together with eight bugs in the recently released Mac OS X 10.5, known as “Leopard.”

Apple released the security fixes in combination with a 10.5.2 update to Leopard, which consists of dozens of additional updates.

Several of the security flaws are exceptionally serious, and may possibly be exploited by hackers to run illicit software on a victim’s computer, even though Apple did not report any occurrences of this taking place.

The patches include fixes for Safari, Mail, Launch Services, the Mac OS Directory Services, Open Directory and Parental Controls. There are additionally patches for numerous Unix components that ship with Apple’s software, together with a newly patched flaw in the Samba file-and-print software.

“The Samba bug was expected, since all the open-source distributions released fixes a while ago,” said Andrew Storms, nCircle’s director of security operations.

This is the second consignment of fixes inside the last two months. Apple released 41 patches for OS X in December.