for not providing timely patches to your browser...switching mozilla now.

Firefox is a much more friendly browser.

Really nice of ZDNet to make sure that the article covers the important stuff, like what the vulnerability is exactly, or how to detect if you've been infected. Because without that, the article serves little purpose other than to panic users...

Correction...I should have said Mozilla-based browser. I am in actuality using Firefox.

Slashdot just updated their article with a link to this

At least panicking Microsoft users is a good start.

My favorite details, from the CNN site variation, is that none of the major anti-virus software can detect it, Microsoft hasn't patched it and there seems to be no way to see if you are infected - yet. Joy!

I take one day off for vacation...

Yep, this is EXACTLY the reason I switched to Firefox. It has some nice features, but the real reason is so that I can read news like this with mere curiosity instead of just plain dread.

Another virus uses same hole to allow passwords and credit card numbers to be stolen.

So... Name a good reason to run IE and various functionality patches to it like MyIE. I'd really like to hear one that manages to outweigh having to clean up fraud.

MS users need to be scared. Nothing else seems to work to get some people to switch off their products. Sadly though, many people that have to clean up future fraud messes may not even know how it happened (holes in IIS and IE).

So... Name a good reason to run IE

1. The drag-and-drop/selection semantics in the URL address bar aren't broken.
2. I don't have much choice when it's embedded in my RSS reader.

From a Firefox user:

-Need it to access the Windows Update site.
-Some poorly writen web site features (like roll-over popup menus) will only work in IE. I know it's an authoring issue, but sometimes you need IE to make up for things like this.

I can't think of anything else.

-Zeke

from an opera user:

i need it for gmail.com, unfortunately, among other stubborn sites.

Today I started using FireFox because of this issue, and I like it very much. It's fast and does about everything I want it to. Oh, and I LOVE tabbed browsing!!
There's only one thing I miss : with IE, my bookmarks were always visible in a separate column at the left hand side of my browser screen, which made surfing really easy. WIth FireFox I always have to click on bookmarks and scroll to where the correct link is. This annoys me. Is there a way to always make my bookmarks visible with FireFox too?

View->Sidebar->Bookmarks

1. The drag-and-drop/selection semantics in the URL address bar aren't broken.

Not really sure what this means. Dragging and dropping URLs out to bookmarks? Or something else?

2. I don't have much choice when it's embedded in my RSS reader.

You could e-mail the makers of the software and explain that your are now afraid your computer could be infected automaticially by using their products. The more responses they get like this, the more likely they are to look at switching the core out. The fact that prominent sites are being hacked to get this code out would scare me enough to at least throw an e-mail out.

-Need it to access the Windows Update site.

Valid reason, and the only reason I use IE from time to time. Though I prefer just to use the Windows Update service and allow it to check daily on its own.

Some poorly writen web site features (like roll-over popup menus) will only work in IE. I know it's an authoring issue, but sometimes you need IE to make up for things like this.

Use the webmaster address to make them aware of such issues, and explain why you may not use their site in the future with the security risks of IE. Double the security threat notice to them if they happen to be on IIS. Some web authors are very receptive to feedback like this.

i need it for gmail.com, unfortunately, among other stubborn sites.

GMail works great in Firefox. You may have some luck asking for Opera support as well, since they did add Safari support pretty quickly. Other stubborn sites, see above.

This annoys me. Is there a way to always make my bookmarks visible with FireFox too?

View menu, Sidebar, Bookmarks

A few valid reasons here, but all the same ones in the past. Do these reasons really justify the risk? I know Heather is not to pleased about cleaning up fraud on her credit report right now (from her conversation in IRC), and I don't think I'd be willing to deal with it just for using IE to get to some site.

I do hope people are at least considering running IE only as a last resort. There is even an extension to Firefox to add a "Open in IE" context menu if it becomes necessary. But honestly, feedback to the webmasters is the best way to change things. I personally don't come across IE only pages on my day to day use. My work even has a policy that all internal sites must work in Mozilla 1.1 based browsers and above, along with IE.

Ah! That did it! Thanks so very much !

Well both of my computers have been acting very strangely since Monday but I haven't been redirected to any sites. Just very slow (I have ADSL) about downloading pages with graphics or bars, sometimes it even times out or the page is just about done loading then I get a cannot find server message. I called the help desk and it tested fine on their end but they could tell on my end it was more like a 14K modem. I have someone coming out Tuesday evening to check the phone lines inside.

I did download Firefox this morning even though it took almost 2 hours instead of the 10 minutes it should have taken.

I hope I don't have any viruses since I update mine a few times a week and am very careful what sites I do go to and rarely open attachments.

> MS users need to be scared.

You know, these holes in IE have not been used really badly yet, but they will. Right now they just install spyware, but how long until someone uses it to write a program to delete someone's hard drive. Or combines a trojan, a virus, and a worm into some kind of master virus program, kind of like this one has but a step further. One that installs itself through IE's holes like a trojan to get around firewalls, acts like a virus to spread itself around the internal networks, hacks into the now unfirewalled servers like a worm, and that installs itself on webpages for others to DL through IE's holes again? I can't be the only one to think of this, there are people a lot more devious and evil than I am working out there. If you are a systems administrator you are asking for trouble in allowing people on your network to use IE to browse the Internet.

These holes may be why my dad has been having problems with his compuer. I've removed so much ad-ware, and viruses.. but this sounds like his problem (and many of his co-workers). ZDNet mentioned some banks are infected, and that is where my dad primarilly surfs... Wells Fargo. Thanks for the news! (and the post in announcements!)

yesterday I installed firefox 0.9. I started at about 4pm. I was up until 4am.
I could not put it down. the install took a few minutes and was faultless.

I was very happy with IE and OE, last week I started using Tbird just because I have a spam problem. now I don't.

If you're an IE user you should really try firefox. It'll be painless.
I wont switch back.

I wish they sold an Operating System.

Is there a Google toolbar for Firefox? I use that dozens of times a day, and I don't like the version that sits in the taskbar.

short answer : yes

Long answer : Yes, there's a Google toolbar. I just switched to FireFox yesterday too and I was happily surprised that it was in there. In fact, it's an even better toolbar than the Google toolbat in IE. OK, it doesn't kill pop ups, but there's no need cause FireFox does that all by itself. But the really great part is that you can install other search engines as well, and all very painless. Then you can seach on all those search engines that you've installed. Eg. I was pleasantly surprised to find that IMDB was also amoung the seach enines offered. Right now I've got the Belgian Google loaded, IMDB and Altavista. And it all works great.

Does anyone else get the navigation buttons in mutiple sets on the main toolbar? I started getting that after I installed and changed themes, I can't get it back to normal now... (See attachment)

And something like IEspell for Firefox would be cool. Anything available?

edit
I went into the Customize option for toolbars and was able to remove all the extra buttons. It seems that it willl make them appear 3x when I change Themes at times.

I keep finding more and more cool stuff this browser can do. I like it, I like it!!!

Thanks, now I'll try it. *edit* Nevermind, I'm going to look through Tony's Firefox thread to see what he asked about.

I'm already a bit pissed with the way it's showing my pages. I know IE is very lenient with how it writes pages, but this is a CSS issue, and for a standard it really sucks. Grr.

Dragging and dropping URLs out to bookmarks? Or something else?

It seems that one of the things I regularly do in a browser is edit the address (to go to the top level page of a site, e.g.).

In IE, this consists of the following steps:

1. Click in the address bar.
2. Drag the mouse to select the portion of the address I don't want.
3. Press Del (or type in the replacement text).

In Firefox, step 2 triggers a drag-and-drop action, which means I have to click again to deselect all of the text before I can drag-select the portion I want to replace.

Yeah, it's seemingly minor, but it was frustrating enough to keep me from using Firefox as my primary browser. And I have tried -- it's installed as my default browser on my laptop (along with Tbird, rather than Outlook).

With this security hole (are there any non scaremongering links to the details yet?), I might be forced to reconsider, but I'll still find it annoying.

And as for my RSS reader (RSS Bandit), I won't be able to switch to using Firefox unless it's as easy to embed in a C#/.NET application as IE is.

I've got another little annoyance with Firefox. Yeah, the Google toolbar is cool, but can I move it so that it isn't all the way to the right? And I'd prefer multiple text boxes for each engine to one, but whatever.

*edit*
And a drop-down search history would be nice.

Well, thats the google search box. There is a full blown "google bar" addon here.

I've searched a bit, but I can't find it either. So I guess it isn't possible, but then again, I'm hardly a Firefox expert. Maybe Bitt or Drakino know an answer to that one.

Come to think of it, there IS one minor annoyance I have with the search feature. When searching with the google toolbar, the words you seached for ended up on the toolbar. You could then easily search for those words in the found text by clicking them. This isn't possible with Firefox (or at least, I haven't found out how to do that yet). As I said, minor annoyance...

Another thing I think is a big plus with Firefox is the way spyware doesn't stand a chance with it. I use ad-aware almost on a daily basis, and it always finds 20-30 spyware entries. After surfing the whole day yesterday and today with firefox, ad-aware found... nothing! That's great stuff if you ask me!

I don't think Adaware or the others scan Firefox cookie files, but you can go to the Privacy option, cookies, and say accept only from the originating server to stop ad cookies. You can also see cookies set currently and permanently block ones you don't want.

Well, I broke my FIrefox install big time. I added a bunch of extensions and restarted FIrefox, now I get no window. firefox.exe shows up in the processes, but not in the applications window of the Task Manager.
Off to the Firefox Support Forum, unless someone here knows how to fix it. I uninstalled, deleted and reinstalled, but no joy...

PS I like Thunderbird, and I sure was liking Firefox tillI broke it badly...