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So I keep getting spyware/malware, and I think I have an idea why

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Ecrofirt

Member
OK, I go to some sites that pop up one of these windows in IE:
screen_secdialog.gif


I go through the process of clicking no several times, and I've never run into a problem there.

I've noticed though, that a window like that doesn't popup in FireFox. Is FireFox automatically blocking it, or is it automaticaly installing it? It always seems that sometime after I go to one of said sites, I'll have a bunch of spyware (things like BlazeFind, WinAdTools, etc).

Anyone have any idea? These are sites that I'm going to continue going to, so I want to know if I should be using FireFox to view them, or just use IE on those specific sites.
 

Anthropic

Member
Firefox can't install stuff that way, since that install mechanism is ActiveX, which Firefox doesn't support.

Firefox's install mechanism is XPI, which you may have seen if you've installed an extention. XPI always asks for the user's permission before installing anything, and it can only be activated by user action (clicking a link, for example). You can even turn XPI completely if you want, or use the whitelist. At one point, there was spyware being packaged in an XPI, but the Firefox developers quickly changed that by requiring user action to install an XPI package (instead of simply viewing a site) and introducing the whitelist.
 

Ecrofirt

Member
OK, cool.

So it's not coming from those sites then. I guess I'll have to figure out where it's coming from.
 
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