Microsoft Office 2003 Service Pack 2 contains significant security enhancements, in addition to stability and performance improvements. This update applies to the following programs: Microsoft Office Professional Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Small Business Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Basic Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Standard Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Student and Teacher Edition 2003, Microsoft Office Access 2003, Microsoft Office Access 2003 Runtime, Microsoft Office Excel 2003, Microsoft Office FrontPage 2003, Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003, Microsoft Office Outlook 2003, Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003, Microsoft Office Publisher 2003, Microsoft Office Word 2003, Microsoft Office 2003 Web Components, and Microsoft Office XP Web Components.
Overview
Microsoft® Office 2003 Service Pack 2 contains significant security enhancements, in addition to stability and performance improvements. Some of the fixes included with SP2 have been previously released as separate updates. This service pack combines them into one update.
Included in this Service Pack
This service pack includes updates previously released for Office 2003:
Office 2003 Service Pack 1
Security Update for Office 2003 WordPerfect 5.x Converter: KB 873378
Office 2003 Security Update: KB838905
Update for Office 2003 French Grammar Checker: KB873381
Office 2003 Tablet PC Update: Improved Ink Recognition
Update for Microsoft Office InfoPath® 2003: KB887982
Update for Office 2003: KB887980
Update for Office 2003: KB885828
Update for Office 2003 French Spelling Checker and Thesaurus: KB892258
Security Update for Word 2003: KB887979
SP2 will install even if a publicly available update has already been installed on your computer.
SP2 also includes stability improvements developed as a result of user input from the Microsoft Online Crash Analysis in Office 2003 and from Microsoft Product Support feedback.
You can get specific information about this update in the Microsoft Knowledge Base article (887616): Description of Office 2003 Service Pack 2.
Microsoft Office Communicator 2005 and Office 2003 SP2
If you are using Office Communicator 2005, you should exit Office Communicator by right-clicking on the Communicator icon in the system tray and choosing "Exit" prior to installing Office 2003 SP2. If you do not exit Communicator, you will be required to reboot your computer after Office 2003 SP2 has been installed. For more information, see the Microsoft Knowledge Base article (905726): You are prompted to restart the computer when you install an update to the Mso.dll file on a computer that is running Microsoft Office Communicator.
Microsoft Office Outlook® 2003 Phishing Protection and Junk E-mail Filter
SP2 contains a new Phishing Protection feature to be used with the Outlook Junk Email Filter. Phishing is the luring of sensitive information through e-mail, such as passwords and other personal information, by an attacker masquerading as someone trustworthy. Phishing attacks can result in a user divulging sensitive information, including financial information, that can result in a loss of privacy or money. Phishing e-mail is hard to identify, because attackers make their e-mail appear genuine and often mimic recognizable e-mail sent out routinely by legitimate organizations such as banks and credit card companies.
To enable phishing protection, you need both Office 2003 SP2 and the latest Outlook 2003 Junk E-mail Filter Update. Once both are installed, Office 2003 SP2 has phishing protection turned on by default.
For best results, we recommend you regularly download the latest version of the Outlook 2003 Junk E-mail Filter Update. To determine whether you need this update, see the Microsoft Knowledge Base article (872976): How to obtain the latest Outlook 2003 Junk E-mail Filter.
More information for this update can be found at
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=57E27A97-2DB6-4654-9DB6-EC7D5B4DD867&displaylang=en
