TechNews

Microsoft SUS Users Finally Receive Patches

By Gregg Keizer, TechWeb News
Users of Microsoft's Software Update Services (SUS) can now download this month's patches after a day-and-a-half delay, the Redmond, Wash.-based developer said Thursday.

Earlier this week, Microsoft released a single security bulletin that patched three bugs in Windows's processing of Metafile images, but users of SUS weren't able to receive them.

SUS, which will be dropped at the end of 2006, is a free add-on to Windows 2000 and Windows Server 2003 that delivers patches to Microsoft's products. It's similar to Windows Update, but lets companies host updates on a server inside the firewall; clients then reach out to that server for their updates.

"We’ve run across an issue affecting SUS that we’re investigating whereby the update can't be deployed," said Microsoft Wednesday on its Security Response Center (MSRC) blog.

Other patch processors, such as Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) and Microsoft Update, were unaffected by the outage.

Late Wednesday, Microsoft fixed the problem and began rolling out the patches to SUS customers.

"We had an unforeseen problem with a machine that handles creating those packages and we're investigating how we can prevent such things in the future," said Stephen Toulouse, who heads the MSRC, in a separate blog entry on Thursday.

System administrators relying on SUS left heated messages on Microsoft's SUS newsgroup. "This delay is going to be challenging to explain to my IT Operations Director," wrote someone identified as Bruce Kleier on the newsgroup. "Having the test lab put on hold for no apparent reason is not only costing my company money, but also their tolerance in my ability to deliver the almost monthly security patch set."

Ironically, Microsoft states on its SUS Web site that "We strive to release updated SUS content at the same time as it becomes available on Windows Update, but occasionally there may be a short delay (2 to 3 hours)."

SUS users waited approximately 36 hours for the security patches to come available.

posted by Rok @ 9:56 PM