Firefox update offers security fixes

Computerworld - Internet Explorer users are not the only people patching browsers this week. Mozilla Corp. yesterday released a new version of its Firefox browser that adds native support for Apple Computer Inc.'s Mac OS X running on Intel Corp.'s processors, and contains a number of important security fixes for all Firefox users.

The new version of the browser, Firefox 1.5.0.2, was released yesterday afternoon. It is being labelled a "stability and security" release by the Mozilla team, meaning that it addresses critical security problems as well as a number of other bugs.

"We're identifying this as a critical release and we're strongly recommending that everyone update as soon as possible," Mozilla said in an e-mail statement.

Software updates should be delivered automatically to users of the Firefox 1.5 product over the next few days, but those using earlier versions of the browser will need to manually update their software by visiting Mozilla.com.

With the improved Mac OS support, Firefox now will be able to take advantage of performance enhancements in the chipsets used by Apple's new Intel-based Macs, which were introduced earlier this year.

This should speed up Web browsing on these new systems, which had previously relied on Apple's Rosetta translation technology to run Firefox.

Mozilla's update comes two days after Microsoft Corp. released a major security update to Internet Explorer "Update: Microsoft releases critical Internet Explorer patch". That set of patches addressed 10 security-related flaws in the browser, including an unpatched bug that hackers had been exploiting for several weeks.

Mozilla did not immediately provide details on the security problems addressed by the update, but those are expected to soon be added to the project's online.