The Update of automatic links setting must be configured to prompt user before allowing links to be updated.

Overview

Finding ID	Version	Rule ID	IA Controls	Severity
V-17732	DTOO150	SV-53815r1_rule		Medium

Description
If an Excel workbook contains links to other documents and users are not prompted to approve them, the contents of the workbook might change without the users' knowledge because the linked files have changed. This has the risk of introducing corrupt or malicious content into the document. Prompting the user to update links will allow the content to be updated only with the user's knowledge.

STIG	Date
Microsoft Excel 2013 STIG	2018-04-03

Details

Check Text ( C-47886r1_chk )
Verify the policy value for User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Microsoft Excel 2013 -> Excel options -> Advanced -> "Ask to update automatic links" is set to "Enabled". Procedure: Use the Windows Registry Editor to navigate to the following key: HKCU\software\policies\Microsoft\office\15.0\excel\options\binaryoptions Criteria: If the value fupdateext_78_1 is REG_DWORD = 0, this is not a finding.

Check Text ( C-47886r1_chk )

Verify the policy value for User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Microsoft Excel 2013 -> Excel options -> Advanced -> "Ask to update automatic links" is set to "Enabled".

Procedure: Use the Windows Registry Editor to navigate to the following key:

HKCU\software\policies\Microsoft\office\15.0\excel\options\binaryoptions

Criteria: If the value fupdateext_78_1 is REG_DWORD = 0, this is not a finding.

Fix Text (F-46723r1_fix)
Set the policy value for User Configuration -> Administrative Templates -> Microsoft Excel 2013 -> Excel options -> Advanced -> "Ask to update automatic links" to "Enabled".