If It’s Thursday, It Must Be Time To Patch Flash

If you watch YouTube videos or read PDF files, you’re gonna want to pay attention.

After attacks, Adobe fixes Flash bug

Less than a week after fielding reports that hackers were targeting a bug in its Flash Player software, Adobe Systems has rushed out a fix for the problem.

Adobe’s new 10.1 Flash update, released Thursday, fixed a bug that was first spotted via a small number of targeted attacks late last week.

According to Symantec, these Flash attacks are still not widespread, but users should update their Flash software as soon as possible. “We have been seeing a small but steady rise in detections of related malicious PDFs and we expect to continue to see these numbers increase over the coming hours and days,” the security vendor said in a statement.

Criminals have been exploiting the flaw using malicious Flash swf files, which are typically opened by the Web browser’s Flash Player plugin, or via PDFs that have maliciously encoded Flash components embedded inside them, Adobe said Thursday. Those malicious PDFs are typically opened by Reader or Acrobat, which include their own versions of Flash Player that have not yet been patched. That fix is due June 29.

Thursday’s update includes an unusually large number of security bug-fixes, 32 in all. “It’s a huge number of bugs fixed, something along the lines of what we’d expect of Apple,” said Andrew Storms, director of security operations with nCircle Network Security.

Adobe’s Flash and Reader software have emerged as prime hacking targets in the past year, and the company is toying with the idea of releasing more frequent security updates to keep pace.

See also:
Adobe Flash Player version 10.1
Exploit for new Flash vulnerability spreading fast
Adobe releases Flash 10.1 and patch bundle
Adobe Issues Massive Flash Security Update
Adobe plugs 32 security holes in ‘critical’ Flash Player patch
Adobe Issues Security Patch
Adobe Flash Player 10.1 released for Windows, Mac, Linux
Adobe debuts What Jobs Hates™ v10.1
Adobe Releases Flash Player 10.1, AIR 2
Adobe releases Flash Player 10.1 for Mac
Adobe Reader 9.3
Adobe Systems

Be careful, the Flash update tries to install Google Toolbar by default. So, unless you want Google Toolbar, make sure you uncheck the box for Google Toolbar before you hit the install button. If Google Toolbar gets mistakenly installed, you can always uninstall it using Control Panel/Add or Remove Programs.

/damn, I hate it when software vendors try and tack on unrelated, third party software by default to the software download you actually want to install

ACORN Takes A Shot At The Messengers

Who said there’s no such thing as bad publicity? The discovery process alone ought to be quite revealing. One thing’s for sure the money and pro bono lawyers will pour in to defend this lawsuit.

ACORN sues filmmakers

ACORN filed suit Wednesday in Baltimore, Maryland, against two filmmakers who secretly recorded videos embarrassing to the agency, claiming the pair violated state law by recording their conversations without permission of the employees involved.

The lawsuit seeks an injunction preventing the further distribution of the videos.

The recordings represented “clear violations of Maryland law that were intended to inflict maximum damage to the reputation of ACORN,” the community organizer’s attorney, Arthur Schwartz, said. “Unfortunately, they succeeded.”

Defendants James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles, conservative activists posing as a pimp and a prostitute seeking advice on setting up a brothel with underage girls from El Salvador, recorded the videos in Baltimore and three other cities.

Breitbart.com, registered to Washington Times conservative commentator Andrew Breitbart, is a co-defendant in the lawsuit. Contacted by CNN, Breitbart had no comment on the suit. O’Keefe and Giles did not respond to requests for comment.

See also:
ACORN Sues O’Keefe, Giles and Breitbart.com
ACORN Sues Makers of Hidden Camera Videos
ACORN Vows ‘Serious’ Internal Probe, Sues Filmmakers
ACORN sues hidden-camera filmmakers
ACORN sues Bretibart, ‘pimp, hooker’ duo
ACORN sues undercover filmmakers

Meanwhile, the ground continues to shift underneath ACORN’s foundation as the fallout from “Hookergate” continues to take its toll.

IRS severs ties with ACORN over scandal

The IRS says it is severing ties with ACORN, the community activist group involved in a scandal after employees were caught on video giving advice to a couple posing as a prostitute and pimp.

The Internal Revenue Service said Wednesday it would no longer include ACORN in its volunteer tax assistance program. The program offered free tax advice to about 3 million low- and moderate-income tax filers this spring.

The IRS said ACORN, which is short for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, provided help on about 25,000 returns.

The House and Senate voted earlier this month to sever federal funding to ACORN. And the Census Bureau severed its ties with the group for the 2010 national head-count.

Liberal Dem blasts ACORN

A leading liberal Democrat in the House blasted the embattled community organizing group ACORN Wednesday and said he is urging the White House to withhold any federal funding for the group.

“I am very disappointed in the actions that were taken by members of ACORN,” Massachusetts Rep. Barney Frank, Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said in a statement Wednesday, “and I do not believe that ACORN’s response has been adequate for an organization that has received public funding.”

Frank also said in the statement that he is urging the Obama administration to withhold any additional funding for ACORN “at least until there is very firm evidence that the abuses of which ACORN members have been guilty have not only ceased, but that procedures are in place to prevent them from happening again.”

See also:
IRS, ACORN Sever Ties Over Scandal
IRS, ACORN sever ties over scandal
IRS severs ties to ACORN in wake of latest scandal
I.R.S. Severs Acorn Ties; Group Sues Over Video
Barney Frank flees ACORN
Frank turns against ACORN
Barney Frank, D-Mass: Time to de-fund ACORN
Barney Frank on Acorn
It Was Fraud, Fraud, Fraud, ‘Til Congress Took The Money Away
ACORN Roasting On A Simmering Fire

And ACORN wants even more publicity by filing a lawsuit? Bring it on! Then again, I’m not the one being sued.

/anyway, I know which side I’m rooting for, I hope they get a jury trial and it’s televised