Microsoft has released a pair of emergency updates to fix the “aCropalypse” security flaw found in its native Windows 10 and 11 screenshot editing apps. reports, the company began testing a patch for the vulnerability earlier this week shortly after its .
On Friday night, Microsoft began rolling out public updates for Windows 11’s Snipping Tool as well as Windows 10’s Snip & Sketch app. You can manually tell Windows to fix the app you’re using by opening the Microsoft Store and clicking “Library”, then “Get Updates”. Microsoft recommends that all users install updates.
The aCropalypse fault was first discovered on , and subsequently addressed by Google in the recent Android security update in March. In the case of the Windows 11 snipping tool, it was found that the utility did not correctly overwrite cropped PNG data. The issue didn’t affect all PNG files, but the issue was that bad actors could exploit the vulnerability to partially recover altered images, especially those that had been cropped to omit sensitive information. As with Google’s Android update in March, Microsoft’s patches won’t protect images previously created with its screenshot tools.
