Friday, May 09, 2008

Security Notice: Adobe Reader, and ...

If you didn't upgrade Adobe Reader (the PDF-viewing program many of us still call Acrobat or Acroread) to version 8.1.2 in February, you should take a moment and do it now.

As in, right now.

It turns out that the vulnerabilities in earlier versions now present a much greater risk, due to recent goings-on in the blackhat world. Having an unpatched version of Reader installed on your system means you could pick up an infection just by visiting a malicious website, even if Reader isn't open at the time.

Brian Krebs has the full story, including a direct link to download the latest version. He also offers a link to FoxIt, a free alternative to Reader which I recommend: it's smaller, faster, and probably more secure.

And ...

You may have heard some murmuring lately about a bug in Firefox. I saw the advisory but didn't pass it along, since it applies only to the Vietnamese language pack add-on and I figured that since we won the war, you people should all be speaking English by now not too many people who read this blog use that add-on. Apparently, though, the rumor mill has been doing its usual brilliant job magnifying the extent of the problem, so Mozilla published a follow-up post to dispel some of the FUD. Now you know.

And for being a good netizen and keeping your computer healthy, you may now choose your reward:

3 comments:

bjkeefe said...

"White" explained; e.g., here.

"Cherce" is a test for the trivia-obsessed.

Beth said...

Okay, I cheated and took both rewards.
That video was so awful I can't believe I actually smiled while watching it.
"The voters have stolen my nomination." Hah!

bjkeefe said...

Yes, a guilty pleasure. But who knew subtitles could add so much to a movie?

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