Microsoft recently announced that its applications Office 365 support the Antimalware Scan Interface (AMSI) feature and thus allow antivirus engines to detect and block malicious macros.
Infected macros have long been one of the biggest threats to Microsoft Office users. The company says this new feature will help protect users when working online with documents.
The biggest advantage of AMSI is that it is an open interface that can work with almost any antivirus program, so fromchoice it is supported by Windows Defender and is also supported by third-party products.
AMSI has already been integrated into Office 365 i.e. applications such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Visio and Publisher. But note that macros will not be scanned if the settings security your settings are “Enable All Macros” and listed as trusted or from trusted sites.
Windows 10 and Windows Defender users benefit from additional protection thanks to the cloud-based mechanism that uses the built-in AMSI to determine if a macro is dangerous or not.
“When devices encounter documents with suspicious macro codeorders, το Windows Defender στέλνει στο σύννεφο τα μεταδεδομένα και άλλα χαρακτηριστικά για την εκμάθηση των μηχανών, σε συνδυασμό με signalthose from Office AMSI. The results from machine learning translate into real-time protection for other Windows Defender customers, whether or not they have cloud protection enabled.” notes Microsoft.
AMSI is a technology that was integrated into Windows 10 in 2015 to provide developers with an advanced method for detecting viruses for any data.