Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

MS Issued a Fix For Its Unwanted FireFox Extension

Posted by kdawson on from the unevenly-distributed dept.

As we discussed last February, and again a few days ago after the Washington Post noticed, Microsoft installed without permission a hard-to-remove Firefox extension along with a service pack for .NET Framework 3.5. Reader Pigskin-Referee lets us know that, as it turns out, Microsoft issued a fix a month ago; details here.

22 of 266 comments (clear)

  1. So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And of course, since it's negative towards Microsoft, Slashdot dupes it a few dozen times. That's some quality journalism all-around. Oh, and it was an honest mistake in the first place, not some horrible malicious act.

    Of course, if you read the Slashdot comments, you knew that Microsoft had already fixed it, since the comments are always about 10 times more on-the-ball than the actual posts. Sadly, I think the majority of visitors to this site never dive into the comments section and are probably fed a large spoon of bullshit every morning with their news.

    --
    Comment of the year
    1. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Foofoobar · · Score: 5, Insightful

      When a company like Microsoft 9 out of 10 times makes hostile gestures towards the open source community, are we supposed to run towards them with flowers and candy every time they screw up now and say 'we forgive you darling. lets go have buttsex on the veranda!'?

      I dunno about you but I get screwed in the ass enough and I'm duct taping my shorts and sitting on the porch with a shotgun.

      --
      This is my sig. There are many like it but this one is mine.
    2. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by nizo · · Score: 4, Funny

      Where is my "+1 Insightful but gross" mod option?

      --
      I Am My Own Worst Enemy
    3. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by gmack · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It is not actually fixed. Even had it been removable in the first place it still would have been bad because they should not have installed it without permission.

    4. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by mdm-adph · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Say what you will about people bashing on Microsoft, but this was not an "honest mistake." It was by design, and all Firefox extensions installed this way behave the same way.

      --
      It is by my will alone my thoughts acquire motion; it is by the juice of the coffee bean that the thoughts acquire speed
    5. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by ibookdb · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Has firefox fixed the bug where nobody can install extensions that are enabled by default without user intervention?

      --
      The Internet Book Database
    6. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Beelzebud · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Is it too much to ask that if you have issues with MS that you bring up the legitimate issues and leave the BS alone?

    7. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by docbrody · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Oh, and it was an honest mistake in the first place, not some horrible malicious act.

      Not really buying it. It may not have been some horrible malicious act... but it sure was not some 'innocent mistake.'

      Sure, innocent mistakes happen at big companies (like the whole thing with Amazon de-ranking Gay and Lesbian books). But for a company that is a constant target of anti-trust suits, who is notorious for this kind of thing, you think by now that they would be more careful. Its hard to believe that someone internal at Micrsoft didn't realize what was this was doing and just say 'fuck it' - even if it was a low level developer, somebody had to know - at the very least the guy(s) who wrote the code. I mean come on, this took some work to do. Its not like the amazon issue where practically one click of a check box reclassified a whole genre of books... some one had to put finger to keyboard and code this out.

      So I think its really really hard to call this an innocent mistake. Maybe not a 'horrible malicious act' but once again they are injecting their shit into other peoples shit.

    8. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Xest · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Yeah, you know that button you click when you install updates that has two radio options, one where you accept the terms and one where you don't?

      That's where you gave permission.

      If you didn't install it explicitly, the alternative is that you gave permission when you accepted automatic updates.

      If you don't want these things on your system, then don't give permission. Don't give permission and then claim you never actually gave permission when you blatantly did because otherwise it wouldn't have installed in the first place.

    9. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Blakey+Rat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You could save the teeth gnashing and anal rape metaphors for when you actually have an issue, instead of wasting it on complete non-issues. It might lower your blood pressure in the long run. But that's just my opinion.

      --
      Comment of the year
    10. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by billcopc · · Score: 4, Interesting

      It's bad because the entire philosophy behind Firefox addons is freedom of choice. How hard would it have been for Microsoft to prompt the user whether they want this thing or not ?

      In simpler words: My computer, my decision.

      --
      -Billco, Fnarg.com
    11. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Strilanc · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Everyone seems to be ignoring the fact that uninstallable extensions shouldn't even be allowed by firefox. I remember installing SiteAdvisor, then it was bought by McAfee and they set the "screw you no uninstalls" bit. Not appropriate at all.

      If it can't be uninstalled, then it shouldn't be an extension.

    12. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by melstav · · Score: 5, Informative

      Since you dragged the other discussion into this, allow me to point out a comment in that very discussion which points out why it's nowhere near the same thing. (Like the fact that Sun announced months in advance that they were going to do it, and the fact that you can, in fact remove it.)

      That comment is +5 insightful. You don't even have to drill down to find it. Just scroll a bit. Given that (some of) the comments are regularly more fair and balanced than the article summaries, you ought to at least skim the discussion before you decide whether this guy is bringing something useful to the discussion or just throwing more FUD onto the pile.

    13. Re:So the WaPo reports a story a month obsolete? by Propaganda13 · · Score: 4, Funny

      You must be new here. The majority of people here on Slashdot are meme scripts.

      signed,
      The You Must Be New Here Meme Script

  2. Yeah, a fix by mysidia · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Now there is an 'uninstall' button, but if you press it, the app is only uninstalled for the user who clicked the button, not other users on the computer; there's still no ready means of permanently opting out system wide.

    And they also indicate with every update of the .NET framework it may get re-installed for all users when Windows Presentation components are updated...

    Their fix is even more sly possibly. Now you have the false illusion of being able to remove it....

    And this still doesn't 'fix' the whole issue of installing components / editing the contents of a third party app a user installed without that user's permission.

  3. Better idea yet by Todd+Knarr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Instead of installing it and letting you uninstall it if you don't want it, how about they don't install it and make it an optional thing you can choose to install?

  4. Install certainly isn't for the "common" user by JimMcc · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Sure, they've come out with an uninstall process. But who here thinks that Ma and Pa PC User have a chance in hell of correctly performing the necessary steps? For that matter, who thinks that the common user of a PC will even be aware of the issue in the first place?

    Yes FF allows add-ons. Yes, MS has every right to create an add-on for FF. What really worries me is when a company creates an add-on for the product of their primary competitor which threatens the stability and security of their competitor's product. At a minimum this is dirty pool. To me it just looks like MS continuing to wallow in the sewage of unfair competition.

  5. Now how about Java Quick Starter? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Okay, now tell me how to get rid of the similarly-uninstallable "Java Quick Starter" that nobody seems to be mad about because it's not Microsoft?

  6. Microsoft.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Knowing them, it will leave about 50% of the junk that the addon installed. And 100% of the registry keys they used for it.

  7. Re:The HORROR! by Todd+Knarr · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The objection isn't to them providing support in Firefox. It's in their forcing the add-on into Firefox without asking the user whether they want it or not, when established convention is that the user elects to install add-ons and that if the user hasn't elected to install something it doesn't get installed. This is made especially annoying by the fact that many Firefox users use it precisely because it doesn't support things like .Net.

  8. And the rest of the story... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Scott Hanselman put up a nice post today outlining the whole story. He points out why it turned out this way, how to uninstall it and even put up the source code so you can see their evil ways for those who were too lazy to unzip the xpi.

    http://www.hanselman.com/blog/HowToRemoveTheNETClickOnceFirefoxExtension.aspx

  9. Spaz down, Sparky by Benfea · · Score: 5, Insightful

    While I have my criticisms of Microsoft, I'm hardly a basher. Despite having lots of familiarity with Macs and a tiny bit of familiarity with LINUX, I use Microsoft operating systems exclusively.

    Two things are worth mentioning here. One is that practically any palooka can show up and start one of these threads. Someone probably saw the article in the WP (or an article about the article in WP) and started a thread without doing research and finding out that this is actually an old issue, an issue that was already mentioned back in February on this site, and that Microsoft had issued a fix a month ago. Bone-headed posts happen a lot around here. That doesn't make these threads part of a sinister conspiracy against Microsoft.

    The other thing worth mentioning is that frankly, this is worth mentioning again. While the disabled uninstall button was obnoxious, to me the greater wrong here was sneaking in an extension to a competitor's browser through an automatic OS update without informing the user.