An attacker can run arbitrary commands on Windows machines with a simple bit of HTML, an Israeli security researcher has demonstrated. The exploit will work with IE, Outlook and OutlooK Express even if active scripting and ActiveX are disabled in the browser security settings. The problem here is data binding, an old 'feature' going back to IE4 in which a data source object (DSO) is bound to HTML. Using an XML data source, the researchers operating a Web site called GreyMagic Software came up with a simple example in which a few lines will cause Windows to launch the calculator application thus:
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