October 2009 Patch Tuesday Sets New Record

Microsoft Security Response Center’s October 2009 Bulletin Release Advance Notification:

For October we are releasing 13 bulletins (eight critical and five important), addressing 34 vulnerabilities, affecting Windows, Internet Explorer, Office, Silverlight, Forefront, Developer Tools, and SQL Server. Most of these updates require a restart so please factor that into your deployment planning.

Ten of the 13 bulletins–which include all eight critical vulnerabilities–involve patches for remote code execution vulnerabilities. All versions of Windows and Windows Server, including Windows 7 (scheduled for release on Oct. 22) are affected.

This sets a new record for Microsoft. The previous record was set in June when the company issued 31 updates. I’m not too sure how to take this. I’m certainly glad that Microsoft is addressing its security problems, but the trend is a bit disturbing: 28 patches in December, 2008; 31 patches in June, 2009; and, 34 patches this month. We still have the better part of 3months left in 2009. Will we see another record set before year end?

What do you think? Does this mean that Microsoft is being more security conscious or are there more bugs than ever?

Hit the comments and weigh in.