Software (7887)

Firefox may not be as safe as previously thought

7 January 2005 13:35 GMT / By Stuart Miles

The current talk of the browser world, Firefox, might not be as safer browser as previous thought.

A security flaw has been found that allows hackers to spoof the URL displayed in the download dialogue box that appears when users of the programme choose a file from a website.

The Mozilla Foundation raised the security alert earlier this week, after research from Secunia uncovered the exploit on Mozilla 1.7.3 for Linux, Mozilla 1.7.5 for Windows as well as Firefox version 1.0.

According to Secunia, the problem is that long sub domains and paths are not displayed correctly, which therefore become open to exploit from cyber criminals.

The firm said the threat only scores two out of five on their vulnerability scale, but admitted there is no viable solution to help the browserís 16 million users.

Full tags

Software, PC software, Browsers, Mozilla, Firefox