UPDATED 00:09 EDT / NOVEMBER 12 2015

NEWS

Microsoft’s Patch Tuesday update is killing Outlook

IT admins are being advised to avoid patching their Windows systems due to a dodgy update that’s causing problems with the Outlook email client.

The problems were first brought to light by The Register, which says the issue has to do with the Windows KB 3097877 patch that was issued in yesterday’s Patch Tuesday fixes – officially known as the MS15-115 update.

“We are looking into reports from some customers who are experiencing difficulties with Outlook after installing Windows KB 3097877,” a spokesperson for Microsoft told The Register. “An immediate review is under way,”

Windows KB 3097877 was designed to fix a problem with the way in which Windows handles fonts, but numerous customers have reported problems with Outlook after installing the update.

“Today I’ve deployed latest Outlook patch to all of my clients, and now Outlook is crashing every 10 minutes and then restarting itself. I tried on fresh Win10, no AV with latest patches applied and here we go, Outlook crashing there too,” wrote one user on the TechNet forums.

According to The Register, the problem crops up whenever users open and begin scrolling through an email that uses certain kinds of incompatible fonts. The issue is said to affect Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 on all variants of Windows, but can thankfully can be fixed by uninstalling the patch.

Reddit has also been bombarded with customer complaints about the patch. Many posters there recommend disabling the patch on Windows Server Update Services and waiting for Microsoft to fix it.

Image credit: ClkerFreeVectorImages via pixabay.com

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