A perfect marriage....Windows and Flash

It is only fitting that the two most patched software programs of all time are now going to coordinate patches and bug fixes at the same time.  Sort of like scheduling your root canal and kidney stone removal on the same day.  

Adobe Tuesday announced that it will pair future security updates for its popular Flash Player with Microsoft's Patch Tuesday schedule.

At the same time, Adobe issued an update that patched seven critical Flash vulnerabilities, and Microsoft shipped fixes for Internet Explorer 10 (IE10), which includes an embedded copy of Flash.

But the move to synchronize Flash Player updates with Microsoft's monthly patch schedule was the bigger news. "Starting with the next Flash Player security update, we plan to release regularly-scheduled security updates for Flash Player on 'Patch Tuesdays,'" Adobe said in a statement yesterday.

"Microsoft and Adobe are now officially married," cracked Andrew Storms, director of security operations at nCircle Security, in an email reply to questions. "They started dating when they decided to share the MAPP program [and] once Microsoft agreed to embed Flash in IE10, [it was] inevitable that Adobe was going to be strong-armed into following Microsoft's patch cadence."