gHacks technology news » adobe flash http://www.ghacks.net A technology blog covering software, mobile phones, gadgets, security, the Internet and other relevant areas. Tue, 24 Nov 2009 11:08:45 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.6 en hourly 1 Adobe Releases Flash 10.1 and Air 2.0 Previews http://www.ghacks.net/2009/11/18/adobe-releases-flash-10-1-and-air-2-0-previews/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/11/18/adobe-releases-flash-10-1-and-air-2-0-previews/#comments Tue, 17 Nov 2009 23:14:49 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=18609 Adobe today released two technology previews for Adobe Flash and Adobe Air. Adobe Flash 10.1 Pre-Release and Adobe Air 2.0 Beta are now both available for download at Adobe Labs. Both applications are available for all supported operating systems (Windows, Mac and Linux) although some of the new features introduced are limited to a specific operating system.

Flash 10.1 introduces several new key features including video hardware acceleration (only available in Flash for Windows), better mobility support including smartphone and other Internet-devices support and additional option for media delivery. Users interested in installing the new Flash Player version should note that it is not the final release but a community preview which is mainly aimed at developers.


This public prerelease is an opportunity for developers to test and provide early feedback to Adobe on new features, enhancements, and compatibility with previously authored content. Consumers can try the beta release of Flash Player 10.1 to preview hardware acceleration of video on supported Windows PCs and x86-based netbooks. You can also help make Flash Player better by visiting all of your favorite sites, making sure they work the same or better than with the current player. We definitely want your feedback to help improve the final version, expected to ship in the first half of 2010.

Interested users can take a look at the announcement over at Adobe Labs, read the release notes or watch Flash Player 10 demonstrations online.

The second major release today is the release of Adobe Air 2.0 Beta which also comes with many enhancements over the current Adobe Air release. This includes a long list of features like the following:

* Support for the detection of mass storage devices.
* Advanced networking capabilities like secure sockets, UDP support, and the ability to listen on sockets.
* Support for native code integration.
* The ability to open a file with its default application.
* Multi-touch and gesture support.
* New APIs for access to raw microphone data.
* Webkit update with HTML5/CSS3 support.
* Global error handling.
* Improved cross-platform printing
* Improved security and support for enterprise and government standards.

Like Flash Player 10.1 Adobe Air 2 is a beta release that is not aimed at the general Internet community but at developers who want to test the new technology or adapt their products to make use of these new features and options. Those users can take a closer look at the release notes and the announcement of Adobe Air 2.0 which contains follow up links to get started.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/11/18/adobe-releases-flash-10-1-and-air-2-0-previews/feed/ 1 Mozilla Flash Upgrade Statistics http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/19/mozilla-flash-upgrade-statistics/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/19/mozilla-flash-upgrade-statistics/#comments Sat, 19 Sep 2009 09:31:34 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=16482 firefoxThe Mozilla development team announced earlier that month that they would check the Flash version of Firefox users after each upgrade to inform users about security issues if they were not running the latest version of Adobe Flash. They estimated that more than 80% of all Firefox users would run an outdated – and thus vulnerable – version of Adobe Flash.

First statistics are now in and they do look impressive. On a global scale more than 10 million Firefox users have clicked on the Flash update link posted on the What’s new page shown after Firefox updates in one week. The Mozilla developers have published a graph displaying the overall page traffic, the amount of Firefox users with and without the latest Flash version and the click through rate of those without.

firefox flash

The graph shows that about half of the users who accessed that page in the first week had an outdated version of the Adobe Flash player. Between 27% and 40% of these users clicked on the link that lead them to the Adobe page to update their Flash player. This does on the other hand mean that the majority did not click on the link to update Flash which indicates that there might be room for presentation improvements to get more users to click on that link.

Users who want to test their Flash version can head over to the Adobe website to do so.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/19/mozilla-flash-upgrade-statistics/feed/ 5 Convert Adobe Flash Files To Screensavers http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/16/convert-adobe-flash-files-to-screensavers/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/16/convert-adobe-flash-files-to-screensavers/#comments Wed, 16 Sep 2009 16:29:22 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=16404 Screensavers are not really that useful anymore unless you are connected to an old computer monitor. Today’s top reason for running screensavers is plain and simple entertainment. Yes, there are users out there who believe that it is still necessary to run screensavers to protect the computer monitor but that’s probably not the main reason these days. If you type in screensavers or a similar search term you end up with millions of websites that offer screensavers, some of them even malicious in nature.

It is possible to use a program like Flash Forge to create screensavers instead of searching for and downloading them on the Internet. Flash Forge can turn Flash files, those with the swf extension, into screensavers with just a few mouse clicks.

flash forge

The program will convert the flash file that is being supplied by the user into an executable that will install the screensaver when executed. The user has the option to add multiple files to the screensaver, e.g. to add multiple movies that are played after each other. The installation program can be compressed to reduce the size of it which is useful if web distribution or network distribution is an issue.

Actions after the installation can be defined to show a readme file, open the display properties or start the screensaver automatically. Many users might probably want to turn Flash videos that they have downloaded from Youtube or other video sites into screensavers. These files cannot be loaded into the program right away. Conversion services, like the free Media Convert, can turn the flv files into swf format so that they can be loaded into Flash Forge.

The output quality depends largely on the input file. The screensaver creator has been primarily designed with non-interactive content in mind (movies or images) and won’t work that well with interactive Flash files like games. Interested users can download Flash Forge from the developer’s website. It should be compatible with most versions of Microsoft Windows. It was tested on Windows XP.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/16/convert-adobe-flash-files-to-screensavers/feed/ 1 Mozilla Checks Flash Version After Firefox Updates http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/04/mozilla-checks-flash-version-after-firefox-updates/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/04/mozilla-checks-flash-version-after-firefox-updates/#comments Fri, 04 Sep 2009 21:10:05 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=16038 microsoft windowsWeb browser attacks are an increasing threat these days. Attackers not only expoit web browser vulnerabilities but also those of plugins and add-ons that are installed in the web browser. The Adobe Flash plugin is one of the high priority targets of attackers due to its distribution percentage. A recent article at H-Online estimates that about 80% of web surfers use an outdated version of Adobe Flash which can have a severe impact on system stability and security.

That’s where the Mozilla developers began thinking about solutions for this problem. They quickly came up with the solution to test the version of the Adobe Flash plugin after Firefox updates. Regular Firefox users know that Firefox will open a what’s new page after an update. This what’s new page will contain the Adobe Flash version check.

adobe flash

Firefox users with an outdated version of Adobe Flash will receive the notification that it is outdated. This information contains a link that is directly pointing to the latest version of Adobe Flash at the Adobe website. Hopes are that many users who are running an outdated version of Flash will visit the Adobe website after a Firefox update to download the latest version of Adobe Flash to install it on their computer system.

Users who want to try the Flash check right now can visit the upcoming what’s new page for Firefox 3.5.3.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/09/04/mozilla-checks-flash-version-after-firefox-updates/feed/ 14 Adobe Fixes Critical Shockwave Vulnerability http://www.ghacks.net/2009/06/25/adobe-fixes-critical-shockwave-vulnerability/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/06/25/adobe-fixes-critical-shockwave-vulnerability/#comments Thu, 25 Jun 2009 06:51:09 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=13844 adobe shockwaveAdobe has issues a security patch for their Adobe Shockwave software program that fixes on vulnerability that has been rated critical. The vulnerability gives attackers, who can attack systems remotely, control over affected computer systems. The interesting aspect of the issued patch is that Adobe recommends to completely uninstall Adobe Shockwave 11.5.0.596 or earlier on their computer systems before installing the latest version of the software product in which the security vulnerability has been fixed.

To secure a computer system running Adobe Shockwave a user would therefor have to uninstall Adobe Shockwave, perform a system restart and install the latest version of Shockwave after the reboot.

The Security Bulletin that has been published at the Adobe website gives little information about the vulnerability other than it can be remotely exploited and that it only affects the Microsoft Windows operating system. Users are encouraged to download the latest version of Adobe Shockwave on the program’s website.

It should also be noted that this vulnerability targets only Adobe Shockwave and not Adobe Flash. Thanks goes to Dante for sending me the information per email.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/06/25/adobe-fixes-critical-shockwave-vulnerability/feed/ 12 Adobe Flash Security Scan http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/27/adobe-flash-security-scan/ http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/27/adobe-flash-security-scan/#comments Fri, 27 Mar 2009 11:01:20 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/27/adobe-flash-security-scan/ While Adobe Flash offers many exciting possibilities to web developers and users alike it also introduces several additional security risks to computer systems. We already discussed the impact of so called Flash Cookies which are able to track a user even if he deletes the normal cookies regularly across multiple web browsers.

The HP Security Laboratory has created the application SWF Scan which can be used by both developers and end users to analyse Adobe Flash files for more than 60 vulnerabilities. Usage is pretty simple and straightforward although interpretation of the findings might require a deeper understanding of Adobe Flash or extensive research on the Internet. The application works with both local Adobe Flash files or those embedded in websites.

Users will first have to find out the direct url to the embedded flash file on the website. All web browser provide those capabilities. Firefox users for instance right-click the page and select Page Info from the context menu to get a list of objects that are embedded in the website. A click on the Media tab and a manual search for files of the type embed should be enough to find the url of the Adobe Flash file. A right-click on the flash object will open a menu with the option to copy the url to the clipboard.

adobe flash

Once the url has been copied to the clipboard it can be pasted into the interface of the HP SWF Scan application. A click on the get button next to the url bar will initiate a connection attempt of the Adobe Flash security scanner. If the file is a valid Adobe Flash file it will automatically try to decompile it displaying the findings in the sidebar and the actual source in the right window.

A proficient Flash user can now analyze the code on his own. Everyone else is better of clicking on the Analyze button in the header of the security program. This will analyze the decompiled source code and provide a summary to the user.

hp security

The summary contains a list of vulnerabilities that have been found in the Adobe Flash file. This vulnerabilities mean that the Flash file might be vulnerable to certain exploits. Flash developers can then rewrite part of their application to fix the discovered vulnerabilities. End users on the other hand may be delighted to know that an Adobe Flash file does not contain any of the known vulnerabilities.

SWF Scan is a free download after a mandatory registration at the HP website. It is currently only available for the Microsoft Windows operating system.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2009/03/27/adobe-flash-security-scan/feed/ 2 Flash 10 Breaks Wordpress Flash File Uploader http://www.ghacks.net/2008/11/02/flash-10-breaks-wordpress-flash-file-uploader/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/11/02/flash-10-breaks-wordpress-flash-file-uploader/#comments Sat, 01 Nov 2008 23:20:39 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=8004 I have been trying to use the default Wordpress Flash uploader for the last days only to find out that it did not work at all anymore after updating Flash to version 10. Clicking on the Choose Files To Upload button did not have any effect anymore. The only solution was to use the basic browser uploader instead which only allowed to upload one image at a time; Not very useful for uploading multiple images.

The reason why the Flash uploader in Wordpress was not working anymore was that Adobe disabled the feature to open a file dialog for security reasons in Flash 10 which broke the SWFUpload script Wordpress was using.

A ticket was opened and is currently discussed over at Wordpress and a fix is assigned to Milestone 2.7 of Wordpress which aims for a release in 1-2 weeks. The best solution so far for Wordpress webmasters who use the Flash based image uploader regularly is to keep using Flash 9 for now and update to Flash 10 once the fix comes out.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/11/02/flash-10-breaks-wordpress-flash-file-uploader/feed/ 3 Adobe Flash Player Clickjacking Vulnerability http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/08/adobe-flash-player-clickjacking-vulnerability/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/08/adobe-flash-player-clickjacking-vulnerability/#comments Wed, 08 Oct 2008 12:18:22 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=7493 Dante send me a link to an interesting article that described the latest Adobe Flash Player vulnerability. Adobe published a security advisory yesterday that described a clickjacking vulnerability. In short: An attacker could lure the unsuspecting user into clicking on a link that would give the attacker access to the computer’s microphone and webcam without the user’s knowledge.

Adobe published a temporary workaround to protect the computer system against this form of attack that users should apply until the release of a patch that would fix the critical issue.

To apply the workaround users should visit the Flash Player’s Settings Manager by following the link. There they should click on the Always Deny button which would prevent any website from accessing the microphone and webcam settings.

adobe flash player settings manager

The new setting has to be confirmed in the popup that appears automatically after clicking on the Always deny button. The patch is said to be available before the end of October.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/10/08/adobe-flash-player-clickjacking-vulnerability/feed/ 1 New Information about latest Flash Vulnerability http://www.ghacks.net/2008/05/29/new-information-about-latest-flash-vulnerability/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/05/29/new-information-about-latest-flash-vulnerability/#comments Thu, 29 May 2008 09:05:30 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=4424 A report about a new Flash vulnerability that affected the latest two versions of Adobe Flash was spreading like fire on the Internet yesterday. The Flash Vulnerability was used on specially prepared websites that would exploit the vulnerability to download information and install additional malicious software.

Research however has shown that the latest Adobe Flash version 9.0.124.0 is not vulnerable unless it’s the standalone version on Linux. That means that Windows (and Macintosh) users who have the latest Flash version installed are not vulnerable to the exploit and that Linux users should make sure that they are not running the standalone version of Adobe Flash. Windows users are only vulnerable if they are not running the latest version of Adobe Flash but version 9.0.115.0 of the application.

The latest version of Adobe Flash can be downloaded at the official website. The exploited vulnerability was fixed by Adobe on April, 8 2008 and a detailed report is available here.

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]]> http://www.ghacks.net/2008/05/29/new-information-about-latest-flash-vulnerability/feed/ 1 Vulnerabilities in latest Flash version http://www.ghacks.net/2008/05/28/vulnerabilities-in-latest-flash-version/ http://www.ghacks.net/2008/05/28/vulnerabilities-in-latest-flash-version/#comments Wed, 28 May 2008 17:44:12 +0000 Martin http://www.ghacks.net/?p=4383 A recent vulnerability in the latest Adobe Flash version lead to a massive attack. More than 220000 pages on the Internet have been hacked most likely with an automated tool using a SQL injection attack. Those pages, some of well respected companies such as Nokia but also many non-profit organizations and town websites, redirect the user to websites that host the exploits for the Flash vulnerability.

If the system meets the requirements the exploit is used to download and execute trojans that steal information and droppers that download additional trojans. Information that are stolen are for example World of Warcraft account information while the droppers download files that add the computer to a botnet. (according to Trendmicro)

Most antivirus companies have already updated their software to disable the possibility that this exploit can be used on the computer the software is running on. Your best bet if you do not use antivirus software is to either disable Flash for now or use an extension like NoScript to block Flash on every domain but trusted ones.

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