In a Thursday announcement, Microsoft revealed that on its forthcoming Patch Tuesday, August 10, the company will issue record-setting 14 security bulletins to fix a record-tying 34 flaws – eight of them ‘critical’; six ‘important’ - in Windows, Internet Explorer (IE), Office, SQL and Silverlight.

The announcement by Microsoft implies that the 14 updates scheduled for the “Massive Patch Tuesday” – as security risk and compliance provider Qualys’ CTO Wolfgang Kandek has termed it - will be a record count. It will be one more than the 13 updates issued by the company in both February 2010 and October 2009. 

In addition, the patching of 34 individual vulnerabilities equals the single-month record that was first set in October 2009, and repeated in June 2010; and the eight ‘critical’ will also tie the October-last-year record.

According to specific details mentioned in Microsoft’s monthly advance notification, the affected software includes: Windows 7; Windows XP; Vista; Windows Server 2003 and 2008; Windows Server 2008 release 2; IE 6, 7 and 8; Office XP Service Pack 3; Office 2003 Service Pack 3; 2007 Microsoft Office System Service Pack 2; Office 2004 and 2008 for Mac; Office Word Viewer; Office Compatibility Pack for Word, Excel and PowerPoint; 2007 File Formats Service Pack 2; Microsoft Works 9; and Silverlight 2 and 3.

Referring to the huge Patch Tuesday lineup and saying that “a large month was expected,” Kandek added: “This is big, not only because of the numbers, but also because they'll affect everybody.”