Microsoft Reissues August Security Patch for Exchange Servers -- Redmondmag.com

Microsoft Reissues August Security Patch for Exchange Servers

By Kurt Mackie
08/16/2023

Microsoft this week announced that it reissued August security update packages for Exchange Server 2016 and Exchange Server 2019.

The security update reissuance is being done to address a problem where the Exchange Server Setup function failed for some users of non-English language edition operating systems. Worse, it left "Exchange services in a disabled state." The problem occurred after some Exchange Server users applied Microsoft's August 8 "update Tuesday" security patch release.

Microsoft did later issue a workaround for the problem. However, now it has reissued its Exchange Server security update package containing a more permanent solution to the problem.

This new August security update for Exchange Server is labeled "v2." Here's how to tell the difference between the two Exchange Server security update releases, per the announcement:

Aug SUv1: original August 2023 SU (released on 8/8/2023)
Aug SUv2: re-released August 2023 SU (released on 8/15/2023)

The Exchange administrators who applied Microsoft's workaround will be the most burdened by Microsoft's reissuance of the August security update release. These IT pros need to take action, namely:

Uninstall Aug SUv1 and reboot
Remove the manually created "Network Service" account (if it still exists)
Install Aug SUv2 and then later SUs (when released)

The IT pros that applied the workaround need to follow the order described above. Moreover, the workaround users need to uninstall SUv1, Microsoft warned:

If you used the workaround, and don't uninstall Aug SUv1 but you delete the "Network Service" dummy account, then installation of Aug SUv2 (or later SUs) will fail with the same behavior as Aug SUv1.

The announcement included a decision-tree table for actions that IT pros should take. One commenter in Microsoft's post described uninstalling the August SUv1 and installing the August SUv2, saying that it took "1 hour to complete" for Exchange Server 2016 running on Windows Server 2016.

The disabled Exchange services from Microsoft's August security update apparently hit German Exchange Server users hard. A blow-by-blow account of their troubles can be found in this Born's Tech and Windows World post.

About the Author

Kurt Mackie is senior news producer for 1105 Media's Converge360 group.

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