According to foreign media reports, Microsoft has urged its Windows XP users to upgrade the pre-loaded Adobe Flash Player 6.0 due to multiple security flaws on Tuesday.

Microsoft has released the #979267 safety proposal to urge its users either upgrade to the latest version of Flash Player or unload the old one due to several security flaws found in the early 6.0 version.

It’s very rare that Microsoft would propose safety advice for third-party products. It does so because the Adobe Flash Player 6.0 is pre-loaded in Microsoft Windows XP and it’s necessary to remind users that Adobe had stopped supporting Flash Player 6.0 since 2006. The latest version of Flash Player is 10.0.42.34.

Microsoft’s purpose is very clear, they hope the users understand that the security flaw only occurs when the old version of flash player and old Windows are used at the same time, because the new Windows are without built-in Flash Player yet.

Microsoft said: “Adobe Flash Player 6.0 is provided at the same time with Windows XP, it contains several security flaws that may execute remote control code when browsing some specially-made webpages. Adobe has fixed those vulnerabilities in the latest Flash Player. Microsoft strongly recommends to upgrade to the latest Flash Player for those who is still using the old version of Windows XP and Adobe Flash Player 6.0.”. Nevertheless, Microsoft indicates that there is no attack found so far related to those security flaws.

This security proposal is released for Adobe Flash Player 6.0 and together with other security vulnerabilities on Tuesday. The service pack this time will affect all the Windows system, but only the Windows 2000 is catalogued to “Critical” level while other subsequent versions of Windows are put to “Low”, so the Flash issue is more important and with higher priority.

According to the foreign media reports, Firefox developer Mozilla said recently that the newly-released Firefox upgraded version with flash auto-detect mechanism has led to 10 million latest flash downloading from Adobe website in a week.

Mozilla released Firefox latest upgraded version 3.5.3 and 3.0.14 last week which perfectly fixed three critical security flaws in the previous version. In addition, in order to prevent attackers using Firefox plugin flaw to attack its users, new versions will initially detect whether the flash player that Firefox using is the latest or not.

Mitchell Baker, chairman of Mozilla, said that in the last week, about 1/3 new version users have downloaded the latest flash player from Adobe after seeing the reminding message. “User response rate is very high, usually the response rate is only 5% when they see software upgrade information.”, Mitchell said.

Mozilla security team personnel Jonathan Nightingale explains that the fact a large number of Firefox users would like to update flash player indicates the importance of network security issues. He said last week the reason why new Firefox has to detect whether the flash player it is using the latest version or not is: first, flash player is very popular; second, 80% Firefox users are still using the old version flash player according to a corresponding survey.

Adobe company also confirmed that the visitors of flash player upgrading webpage in the past week had a rapid growth. Adobe products security and privacy department director Brad Arkin appreciated the latest detecting mechanism very much by saying “For Adobe, it’s definitely a good thing for massive users to have the upgraded flash, it assures their security and we are very happy to see Mozilla sending the flash upgrading message to its users.”

P.S. You may be also interested in another blog about How to Delet Flash SWF Cache under Firefox.

Flash is a very common format used to deliver animations over Internet. Flash brings us a lot fun but at the same time, flash viewers have to concern the security issues as well. The first flash file virus WF/LFM.926 appeared in early 2002 but was fortunately refused by patch tools emergently released from Macromedia company. However, just after two years in November, 26th, 2004, another new virus DJ2005 (Win32.Troj.QQMydj2005) which can be downloaded automatically with the flash file was found. When you are browsing the exquisite flash files, be extremely careful if another website is opened simultaneously or an irrelevant program is downloaded automatically, because that might be the virus! It can modify explorer. exe process and registry, besides, it can also send messages through QQ to cajole other users.

Strategies: first, scan DJ2005 trojans through free online virus check http://scan.kingsoft.com/; second, make sure your virus database is up to date to prevent any new virus; third, make sure your flash player, flash converter or other flash relevant programs are clean and safe, 100% virus free.

Now there are many teaching videos in the form of SWF spreading on the Internet. Quite useful, but how to watch those teaching videos under Linux operating system?

In fact, these SWF format videos are compiled flash bytecode files and can’t be played by regular video players like MPlayer and VLC Media Player, which otherwise is capable of playing other flash-delivered FLV files. Here comes the topic today: the introduction of three flash SWF players under Linux OS.

1. Swfdec

The earliest open-source flash implementation scheme, is able to play the most of flash 7 format videos and contained in almost all release repositories. Both 32 and 64-bit versions are available.

Installation under Fedora 10: su-c ‘yum install swfdec-gnome’

2. Gnash

Gnash is an emerging open-source flash implementation scheme, currently only supports flash 7 format videos. It’s quite active in the recent two year’s release, there are 32 and 64-bit versions.

Installation under Fedora 10: su-c ‘yum install gnash’

3. Adobe Flash Standalone Player for Linux

Adobe Flash Standalone Player was included in the Adobe Flash Debugger and can be downloaded from Adobe’s official website. There is only 32-bit version available but with the best SWF compatibility due to the official version.

Installation under Fedora 10: download and unzip with 7-zip, double-click the generated flashplayer icon to start. If you want to create SWF play association under GNOME, right-click any SWF file, choose “properties”-“open”-“add”, find and select the unzipped flashplayer, click “ok”. Then check the radio in front to make it the default SWF player, click “close” at last to quit settings.

4. Moyea SWF to Video Converter Std/Pro

Moyea SWF to Video Converter Std/Pro is a SWF player as well as a SWF converter which can convert SWF files to all kinds of popular video formats efficiently and swiftly.

Installation: click here to download and install the trial version for free.

5. Windows Media Player

Usually Windows Media Player can’t play SWF files under the default settings, however, if we manually change some settings, theoretically it can play. To be more precise, I’m still testing it and will write another blog about it when it’s done.

Summary

After the personal test using several English grammar SWF videos, Gnash sometimes may have the asynchronization between video and audio, Swfdec performs well, so does the Adobe Flash Standalone Player and Moyea SWF to Video Converter Std/Pro.

Which among the above-mentioned standalone flash players is your favorite? Pick one and enjoy the SWF teaching videos now!

By the way, If you only have a few SWF files, those standalone flash players might be troublesome. In this case, what you need is just a web browser with flash plugin. Drag the SWF file to the address bar and that’s all it takes to enjoy your nice teaching videos.

Adobe company issued a statement said that it will cooperate with Google and Yahoo! to optimize the flash player technology, so that the flash content can also be searched by searching engines.

According to foreign medias, in order to add the genuine flash content to searching engine results, Adobe is working with Google and Yahoo! now to improve the quality of seaching results by providing the optimized flash playing technology. Adobe flash player advanced product manager Mr. JustinEverett-Church said this project will show the flash content searching results in the form of text and links. Flash-based applications, games, even the contents of advertisements shall be found by searching engines. The flash webpage made in .swf format also can be found easily. He also said: “the flash players will be installed in Google and Yahoo’s server so that they can play real-time flash files. This means the end-users will be guaranteed with better searching results. After all, searching online flash content is always a very big challenge.”

Mr. Vanessa Fox, editor of online media EngineLand, said that this cooperation can be a positive interpretation about how Adobe reacts to searching engines, but it takes time to judge whether it is profitable to do so. He explained: “searching engines are not able to grab any online flash content before. I’m holding a conservative opinion though I am optimistic about this technology. But honestly, still not sure how many webpages can be found by searching engines exactly.” It’s true that those flash-technology-based websites can obtain higher traffic, however, this project is only able to extract text and links from flash files, animations and videos are still not available.

The cooperation between Adobe and Google, Yahoo! will be continued to improve searching technology so that the publishers, developers, and users can all benefit from it. Delightfully, both Google and Yahoo! expressed their huge support for this project.