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The Mac BU at Microsoft has acknowledged a security issue, and has released a fix, and plans to release an update.

The problem is that the Microsoft Office Installer changes permissions for the Microsoft Office install and the Automator Library folder to user 502, or the second account created on a given Mac. It’s not a huge problem, because there is no threat if you only have one user, and if you have more than one user, all that they can do is mess with your Office install. They cannot really do anything malicious to your Mac.

There is a posted fix; it is only two steps in the Terminal. They must be carried out in an administrator account.

In the Terminal, type the flowwing then press “Return”

/usr/bin/sudo /bin/chmod -R a-st
  “/Applications/Microsoft Office 2008” 
  “/Library/Automator” 
  “/Library/Fonts/Microsoft” 
  “/Library/Application Support/Microsoft”

Enter password when prompted.

Now enter this, followed by “Return”

/usr/bin/sudo /usr/sbin/chown -h -R root:admin
  “/Applications/Microsoft Office 2008” 
  “/Library/Automator” 
  “/Library/Fonts/Microsoft” 
  “/Library/Application Support/Microsoft”

Enter password if prompted.

You should be all fixed up.

Future copes of the installer should not have this issue.

Via [ArsTechnica]