CVE-2016-7229
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 Excel 2007 SP3, Excel 2010 SP2, Excel 2013 SP1, Excel 2013 RT SP1, Excel 2016, Excel for Mac 2011, Excel 2016 for Mac, Office Compatibility Pack SP3, and Excel Viewer allow remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a crafted Office document, 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 · high confidenceThis is a memory corruption vulnerability in Microsoft Excel's document parsing logic. When Excel processes a specially crafted malicious Office document, it fails to properly handle memory during parsing, allowing an attacker to overwrite memory and execute arbitrary code with the user's privileges.
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= 2007= 2010= 2013= 2016= 2011= 2016all versionsall 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 Microsoft Excel version on WindowsOpen Registry Editor and navigate to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\ClickToRun\ProductReleaseIDs or HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\[version]\Excel\InstallRoot, or run 'winword /?' from command line if Excel is associated. Alternatively, open Excel, go to File > Account > About Excel to see the version number.Affected if The displayed version matches 2007, 2010, 2013, or 2016 (any build within these major versions).
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Check Microsoft Excel for Mac versionOpen Finder, navigate to Applications, right-click Microsoft Excel, select Get Info, or open Excel and go to Excel > About Microsoft Excel to view the full version number.Affected if The displayed version matches 2011 or 2016.
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Check for Microsoft Excel Viewer installationOn Windows, open Control Panel > Programs and Features, or run 'Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Product' in PowerShell to list installed software. Look for 'Microsoft Excel Viewer' in the list.Affected if Microsoft Excel Viewer appears in the installed programs list.
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Check for Microsoft Office Compatibility PackOn Windows, open Control Panel > Programs and Features, or run 'Get-WmiObject -Class Win32_Product' in PowerShell. Look for 'Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel, and PowerPoint' in the list.Affected if Microsoft Office Compatibility Pack appears in the installed programs list.
If any of the affected Microsoft Excel versions (2007, 2010, 2013, 2016), Excel for Mac (2011, 2016), Excel Viewer, or Office Compatibility Pack is installed on the system, the environment is potentially affected by this vulnerability when processing untrusted Office documents.
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 updates (MS16-148) to all affected Excel installations. Until patched, disable Protected View for email attachments and warn users not to open documents from untrusted sources.
- Consultation2.0 h
- Implementation4.0 h
- Testing2.0 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 $2,560.
Scan for this in your stack
Free · runs locallyCheck whether your project pulls in CVE-2016-7229 — 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-2016-7229 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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- 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
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