CVE-2016-3317
Official description Straight from the sourceThe vendor's or NVD's own wording, published unedited. Authoritative, but often terse — it says what broke, rarely what to do.
NVD · uneditedMicrosoft Office 2010 SP2, Word 2007 SP3, Word 2010 SP2, Word for Mac 2011, Word 2016 for Mac, and Word Viewer allow remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted file, aka "Microsoft Office Memory Corruption Vulnerability."
Technical summary Written by usOur analysis, written from the advisory, the CVSS vector and the affected-version data. It adds context the advisory leaves out, and never invents facts that are not in the source.
dbcve analysis · moderate confidenceMemory corruption vulnerability in Microsoft Office Word allows remote code execution via specially crafted malicious Office documents. The vulnerability affects multiple versions of Word across Windows and Mac platforms.
Verify against the referenced sources before acting — the references below are authoritative for this CVE, this summary is not.
Affected products & versions What the vendor confirmedThe version ranges the vendor confirmed as vulnerable. If your version sits inside a range here, treat yourself as exposed until you have upgraded.
NVD · CPE data= 2010= 2007= 2010= 2011all versionsCVSS breakdown How the score is builtThe industry scoring standard. It rates how the flaw is reached, what it takes to exploit, and what an attacker gains — the score is derived from those, not the other way round.
From the vector- Attack vector
- Local
- Complexity
- Low
- Privileges
- None
- User interaction
- Required
- Scope
- Unchanged
- Confidentiality
- High
- Integrity
- High
- Availability
- High
CVSS:3.0/AV:L/AC:L/PR:N/UI:R/S:U/C:H/I:H/A:H
Am I affected? How to checkSteps we derive from the advisory and the affected-version data, so you can decide whether this CVE reaches your setup. They are a guide, not a scan — your own configuration is the authority.
dbcve checksWork through these to decide whether this CVE applies to you.
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Check if Microsoft Word is installed on WindowsOpen Control Panel > Programs and Features, or run 'Get-ItemProperty HKLM:\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall\* | Select-Object DisplayName, DisplayVersion' in PowerShell to list installed Office products and their versionsAffected if Word, Office 2010, Word 2007, or Word 2010 appears in the installed programs list
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Check Word version on WindowsOpen Word, go to File > Account > About Word, or right-click winword.exe in C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\root\Office## (where ## is 14 for 2010, 12 for 2007) and select Properties > Details to view the File VersionAffected if The version shown is 14.0.xxxx for Office/Word 2010, or 12.0.xxxx for Word 2007
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Check Word for Mac versionOpen Microsoft Word for Mac, click Word menu > About Microsoft Word, or navigate to /Applications/Microsoft Word.app/Contents/Info.plist and check the CFBundleShortVersionStringAffected if The version shown is 14.x (corresponding to Word 2011 for Mac)
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Check if Microsoft Word Viewer is installedSearch for 'WordViewer.exe' in Program Files, or check Add/Remove Programs for 'Microsoft Word Viewer'Affected if Microsoft Word Viewer is present on the system (all versions are affected)
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Verify Office version via registryRun 'reg query "HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\ClickToRun\Configuration" /v VersionToReport' or check 'HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\InstallRoot' for Office 2010Affected if The detected Office version matches 2010 (14.0), or Word component version matches 2007 (12.0) or 2010 (14.0)
The environment is affected if Microsoft Word 2007, Word 2010, Office 2010, Word for Mac 2011, or any version of Word Viewer is installed on the system.
Generated from the published advisory. Verify against your own configuration.
Remediation Closing itWhat it takes to close this. Where a vendor fix exists we point at it; where none exists we say so plainly, and can build one. Effort estimates are scoped from the advisory, not from your codebase.
From vendor dataApply Microsoft security update MS16-099 to all affected Office installations; users should avoid opening untrusted Office files and enable Protected View in Office settings.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing3.0 h
- Review / QA1.0 h
An estimate, not a bill — we confirm scope with you before any work starts. Need it this week? Rush from $2,800.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2016-3317 — or any other known-vulnerable package — straight from your lock files. Free and open source; it runs locally and uploads nothing.
References Go to the primary sourcePrimary sources — vendor advisories, patches and trackers. Where our summary and a reference disagree, the reference wins.
Primary sourcesPractitioner notes
ContributedPeer-ranked notes from engineers who’ve handled CVE-2016-3317 in production — separate from our analysis above.
The advisory tells you what broke. It rarely tells you what actually worked. If you’ve dealt with this one, that detail is what the next engineer is searching for.
- The version that genuinely resolved it — not the one the vendor claimed
- A config change or rule that shut the vector down
- A gotcha in the upgrade path that cost you an afternoon
No notes yet
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A place for practitioners to share what actually worked: a mitigation you’ve tested, a configuration change, a version- or environment-specific caveat, or a link to a verified patch. The most useful notes rise to the top as peers upvote them, so the signal stays high.
- Verified mitigations, workarounds, and config changes
- Version or environment caveats, and links to real fixes
- No weaponised exploit code, or anything meant to cause harm
- No spam, self-promotion, credentials, or personal data