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Mozilla yesterday said it will follow other browser markers by curtailing use of Flash in Firefox next month.
The open-source developer added that in 2017 it will dramatically expand the anti-Flash restrictions: Firefox will require users to explicitly approve the use of Flash for any reason by any website.
As have its rivals, Mozilla cast the limitations (this year) and elimination (next year) as victories for Firefox users, citing improved security, longer battery life on laptops and faster web page rendering.
"Starting in August, Firefox will block certain Flash content that is not essential to the user experience, while continuing to support legacy Flash content," wrote Benjamin Smedberg, the manager of Firefox quality engineering, in a post to a company blog.
Firefox 48 is slated to ship on Aug. 2.
[...]
Firefox is late to the dump-Flash party.
Original Source: http://www.computerworld.com/article/3098606/web-browsers/firefox-sets-kill-flash-schedule.html
-- submitted from IRC
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 25 2016, @08:31PM
I'm really torn about this Kill Flash thing. On the one hand, Flash is a terrible program full of security holes. So eliminating it seems like it is for the greater good.
On the other hand, what you have here are a bunch of companies essentially conspiring to eliminate another company's product. What would we say if Microsoft used its market power to destroy a web browser? What would we say if all the banks colluded to deny black people mortgages? Etc.
Does anybody have any good arguments why this is either clearly a good thing or clearly a bad thing?
Incidentally, part of the reason I'm hesitant is that I don't fully trust HTML5 in terms of DRM and security vulnerabilities... can somebody more informed than me provide some insight in that? (Yes, I'm aware that Flash is horrible in regard to both of those as well, but at least it provides another option.)
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Tuesday July 26 2016, @12:08AM
Has there been a month without a critical flaw in Flash Player in the past two years? When is it right to simply say, "ENOUGH!"
Adobe has made it clear they do not plan to invest the resources needed to make it safe, they are in fact trying to migrate their content creators away from Flash. It is just laziness and inertia keeping Flash alive now, time to put it down. For everyone's safety.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 26 2016, @01:18AM
I'm sure that if Adobe really cared, they'd have complained earlier. Instead of doing that, like they did when iOS killed flash, they've just shrugged their shoulders and moved on. I'm sure they secretly cannot wait for flash to die so they can finally put that behind them. After all, it's not like flash is the big cash cow it used to be.