Science and technology news blog

Hi

You can download Firefox 3 from the following link:

http://rapidshare.com/files/123304491/Firefox_Setup_3.0.exe

I got up in the morning and started my computer. Lo and behold, Firefox had another update. This time its 2.0.0.5 the version number. Mozilla foundation provides a full list of current vulnerabilities here. The main patches that were fixed are as follows:

1. XPCNativeWrapper pollution


2. Unauthorized access to wyciwyg:// documents


3. Remote code execution by launching Firefox from Internet Explorer


4. File type confusion due to %00 in name


5. Privilege escalation using an event handler attached to an element not in the document


6. Frame spoofing while window is loading


7. XSS using addEventListener and setTimeout


8. Crashes with evidence of memory corruption

Mozilla has officially released the first public alpha build of Firefox 3.0. Codenamed Gran Paradiso, Firefox 3 includes the new Gecko 1.9 rendering engine which leverages the open-source Cairo rendering framework and features heavily refactored reflow algorithms that improve Firefox layout functionality and resolve some long-standing CSS bugs.

The reflow improvements in Gecko 1.9 (included in the latest Gran Paradiso nightly build, but not the alpha release) finally enable Firefox to pass the Acid 2 test, a CSS test case developed by the Web Standards Project to illuminate flaws in HTML/CSS rendering engines. To pass the Acid 2 test, browsers must comply with W3C standards and provide support for a wide variety of features that are considered relevant by Web designers. The Acid 2 test has been passed by several other browsers, including Safari, Konqueror, and Opera, but not Internet Explorer. Passing Acid 2 is considered to be a significant milestone in Firefox development.

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A flaw in Mozilla Corp.’s Firefox browser makes it easy for cybercriminals to steal user information on Web sites where users create their own pages, such as MySpace.com.

The flaw lies in Firefox’s Password Manager software, which can be tricked into sending password information to an attacker’s Web site, said Robert Chapin, president of Chapin Information Services Inc. For this attack to work, attackers need to be able to create HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) forms on the Web site, something that is allowed on blogging and social networking sites.

The attack was used in a MySpace phishing attack reported in late October. In that attack, users registered a MySpace account named login_home_index_html and used it to host a fake log-in page that exploited the flaw.

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The newly released Mozilla Firefox 2.0 and Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 Web browsers both include new technology to help flag and block phishing sites—those authentic-looking Web sites set up by scammers to trick users into entering personal financial information.

So how do the browsers stack up against one another in a no-holds-barred, anti-phishing slugfest? One third-party test that pitted the browsers against two week’s worth of phishing sites concluded that Firefox’s phish net may have fewer holes than IE’s.

The evidence comes in a report released today by software testing firm SmartWare. The company tested each browser against the same phishing sites flagged by contributors to Phishtank, an anti-phishing network run by OpenDNS.

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The web browser is a cornerstone of the modern desktop or laptop. It provides a point-and-click interface to the internet. However, Microsoft is no longer the only serious player in this market.

Web monitoring specialist NetApplications.com says the software colossus commands more than 80 per cent of the browser market with Internet Explorer, which has been baked into every version of Windows for the past decade. A mere two years ago, that figure was a seemingly unassailable 92 per cent.

However, a sleek browser named Firefox has been eroding Microsoft’s market share since its impressive debut in November 2004 and it now counts 12.5 per cent of web users as its devotees.

So it’s no surprise that Microsoft last month unleashed IE7, a fresh version of its venerable web browser, which largely echoes Firefox’s roll call of features to make web surfing faster, easier and safer. That same week Firefox shot back its own salvo with the release of the long-awaited Firefox 2.

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Adobe Systems has opened up the source code for the scripting language of the widely used Flash Player to Mozilla Foundation, creator of the Firefox web browser. Access to the code will enable the development of faster and richer interactive Web 2.0 style of applications that will work well with Firefox.

The source code, called ActionScript Virtual machine, is based on the ECMAScript programming standard, which is also used by Microsoft’s JScript and similar to Sun’s JavaScript.

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