Thursday, June 4, 2009

Disable .Net Framework Assistant Firefox Extension

I've just read an article talking about this Microsoft .Net Framework Assistant Firefox extension. Apparently, this extension is automatically installed to your Firefox if you've updated your Windows (Microsoft .Net Framework 3.5 SP1). And guess what? This extension is not even mentioned in the list of changes that this SP1 patch affects. Talk about stealth...

Why do you need to disable it? According to Annoyances.org post here:

This update adds to Firefox one of the most dangerous vulnerabilities present in all versions of Internet Explorer: the ability for websites to easily and quietly install software on your PC. Since this design flaw is one of the reasons you may've originally choosen to abandon IE in favor of a safer browser like Firefox, you may wish to remove this extension with all due haste.


It then teaches you how to uninstall it by accessing the registry. For me, I took the easier way out as I try not to touch the registry too often. I disabled the plugin. To disable the plugin, just do the following:
  1. Launch Firefox
  2. Goto Tools > Add-ons (menubar)
  3. Click on the section for Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant
  4. Click on Disable

It will prompt you to restart your Firefox. That's it.

I wonder what else Microsoft is updating without telling us.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

There is a .net 3.5 SP1 patch to allow this:

http://blogs.msdn.com/brada/archive/2009/02/27/uninstalling-the-clickonce-support-for-firefox.aspx

chantc said...

Thanks for the link. See if I've got time to update to try it out.

DA4h4x0r said...

Look:
http://netassistant.atspace.us/
Upgrade to Firefox 3.5!

Disclosure said...

There are other reasons why people should disable .NET Framework Assistant? What harm is it causing Firefox. Well here is a possible answer. And Firefox today automatically disabled .NFA and WPF!

Battle of the Softwares: Microsoft vs Mozilla Firefox!

chantc said...

My guess is that this assistant supposedly allows ActiveX objects to work in browsers other than IE.

To me, that's a big no no and this feature should never be automatically enabled. I have never enabled ActiveX unless forced to (e.g. Windows Update).

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