CVE-2023-24880

FAQ

According to the CVSS metric, successful exploitation of this vulnerability could lead to some loss of integrity (I:L) and some loss of availability (A:L). What does that mean for this vulnerability?

An attacker can craft a malicious file that would evade Mark of the Web (MOTW) defenses, resulting in a limited loss of integrity and availability of security features such as Protected View in Microsoft Office, which rely on MOTW tagging.

What is the relationship between Mark of the Web and Windows SmartScreen?

When you download a file from the internet, Windows adds the zone identifier or Mark of the Web as an NTFS stream to the file. So, when you run the file, Windows SmartScreen checks if there is a zone identifier Alternate Data Stream (ADS) attached to the file. If the ADS indicates ZoneId=3 which means that the file was downloaded from the internet, the SmartScreen does a reputation check. For more information on SmartScreen, please visit Microsoft Defender SmartScreen overview | Microsoft Learn.