Security & Privacy + Software & Apps

The Mozilla Foundation has released an update for the Firefox web browser, fixing nine security issues, including one critical vulnerability involving crashes with memory corruption. Other issues involve URL spoofing, cross-scripting hazards, and javascript issues. As always, it is recommended that users update their web browsers as soon as security fixes are provided, since these programs are one of the weak links in computer security. You can update Firefox from within the program, or by downloading the latest version here.

It should be noted that Firefox had more vulnerabilities than Internet Explorer in 2008, according to a report from Secunia, though they were fixed more quickly. Naturally, Mac OS X users don’t need to worry about Internet Explorer issues (unless they also run Windows), but Firefox vulnerabilities usually affect the web browser on all platforms, including Mac OS X. Firefox’s 115 flaws were about four times the number that Internet Explorer had, or that Apple’s Safari were found to have.