For those of you who use FireFox

[Un4given]

Remove the Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant (ClickOnce) Firefox Extension

Intended For

Windows 2000

Windows 7

Windows XP

Windows Vista

The Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5 Service Pack 1 update, pushed through the Windows Update service to all recent editions of Windows in February 2009, installs the Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant firefox extension without asking your permission.

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.

Unfortunately, Microsoft in their infinite wisdom has taken steps to make the removal of this extension particularly difficult - open the Add-ons window in Firefox, and you'll notice the Uninstall button next to their extension is grayed out! Their reasoning, according to Microsoft blogger Brad Abrams, is that the extension needed "support at the machine level in order to enable the feature for all users on the machine," which, of course, is precisely the reason this add-on is bad news for all Firefox users.

Here's the bafflingly-convoluted procedure required to remove this garbage from Firefox:

Open Registry Editor (type regedit in the Start menu Search box in Vista/Windows 7, or in XP's Run window).

Expand the branches to the following key:

On 32-bit systems: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Mozilla \ Firefox \ Extensions

On x64 systems: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SOFTWARE \ Wow6432Node \ Mozilla \ Firefox \ Extensions

Delete the value named {20a82645-c095-46ed-80e3-08825760534b} from the right pane.

Close the Registry Editor when you're done.

Open a new Firefox window, and in the address bar, type about:config and press Enter.

Type microsoftdotnet in the Filter field to quickly find the general.useragent.extra.microsoftdotnet setting.

Right-click general.useragent.extra.microsoftdotnet and select Reset.

Restart Firefox.

Open Windows Explorer, and navigate to %SYSTEMDRIVE%\Windows\Microsoft.NET\Framework\v3.5\Windows Presentation Foundation.

Delete the DotNetAssistantExtension folder entirely.

Open the Add-ons window in Firefox to confirm that the Microsoft .NET Framework Assistant extension has been removed.

It will be a great day when PC users no longer have to waste this much time to protect themselves from those who write the software they use. (And if you're thinking, "Why not just use a Mac," may I remind you of the MobileMe junk recently installed on so many Windows machines without their owners' permission!)

Credits go to Annoyances.org for this eye opening security fix.

[marc2003]

old news. and mozilla have rolled out an update which disables it automatically. anybody running the latest version of firefox would have seen a prompt on screen telling them this.

https://www.neowin.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=834612

Just got it myself ...

[thomasfrank09]

I heard about this on Security Now back in June - quite dastardly of Microsoft... I think they said something about it helping non computer savvy users - but hey, those users aren't on firefox...

[soldier1st]

this update don't block anything as i can enable or disable that addon. nice try though.

[Dance.]

Very sneaky of Microsoft :angry:!

[Teddy*]

Thanks for the notification ... !!!

all i can say is that I'm shocked to know this.

Firefox offers the most secure browsing of the www in my opinion and i wouldn't want any extension (addon/plugin) to change that

so thanks again. ;)

[Nightwind Hawk]

Does uninstalling the add-on not do the same thing...?

[HawkMan]

Thanks for the notification ... !!!

all i can say is that I'm shocked to know this.

Firefox offers the most secure browsing of the www in my opinion and i wouldn't want any extension (addon/plugin) to change that

so thanks again. ;)

hehe, yeah sure.

maybe when they add built in sandboxing/safe mode like a certain other major browser, or come close to catching up to Opera on Secunia.

[Chasethebase Veteran]

I got this about a week ago and I just disabled it because I can. No big issue with it though to be honest.

[cooky560 Veteran]

the uninstall option was never greyed for me, so I just uninstalled it :p

the Java one however is impossible to uninstall

[Corris Veteran]

hehe, yeah sure.

maybe when they add built in sandboxing/safe mode like a certain other major browser, or come close to catching up to Opera on Secunia.

Firefox had a Safe mode last time I used it on windows?

[steppenwolf]

Thank you for this. :)

[SyntaxError]

the uninstall option was never greyed for me, so I just uninstalled it :p

the Java one however is impossible to uninstall

Just remove the offending file (npjp2.dll) from the plugins folder and restart FF. Hardly impossible.