Redirect to fake firefox update

Hi Jeff,

I am a long time user of IMDb, not a staff member.

I've had this happen a few times on IMDb within the last two months.

I've encountered the same problem on other sites, such as the New York Daily News. Most likely the cause is malicious ads that appear on the page.

If the pop up occurs, be sure to report site. Under Firefox's help menu, click on Report deceptive site.

DO NOT download the Javascript or exe file.

This is what Firefox support has about the issue:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1127436

No it is not legit. The fake updates exe can install things like trojans, viruses or unwanted software based on past reports.

The desktop Firefox is not just for Windows as it is for Mac OSX and Linux also so .exe would not be an effective way to send out Firefox updates. The updates are done internally in Firefox with a .mar file or by download from mozilla.org like say www.mozilla.org/firefox/all/

Even if Mozilla were to use .exe for Firefox updates on Windows, they would be serving them from a *.mozilla.org url and not from random websites with weird names.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1129758

This is a more recent discussion of the problem. There are indications that this due to a vulnerability of Adobe Shockwave.

The pop up come from various random sites. Here is an example:

I had this happen again about half an hour ago on IMDb. I neglected to record the web page.

I reported the site using Firefox's Report deceptive site link.

Urgent Update
Opening firefox-patch.js
firefox-patch.js
which is: JavaScript File (2.6 KB)
from: https://aphidt2cn.org
Would you like to save this file?

After reporting this site, I received this message.

Google Safe Browsing

Report Sent

Thanks for sending a report to Google. Now that you've done your good deed for the day, feel free to:

1. Take a second to rejoice merrily for doing your part in making the web a safer place.

2. Call/email/write to a neighbor/friend/relative and tell them what phishing is and how they can protect themselves.

3. Learn more about malware that can infect your computer on Stopbadware.org.

Thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts about the advertisements on our site, Jeff.


Please rest assured that your feedback has been forwarded to our staff in charge of advertising for their review.


We occasionally allow pop-up ads and other ad formats because some of
our advertisers have expressed their preference for these alternative
methods of promoting their products and services.


We realize that some of these advertising methods may be more intrusive
or require more user interaction than regular banner ads, so we
constantly work together with our advertisers to substantially limit the
frequency of such ads and achieve a good balance between an effective
promotional exposure and maintaining great site usability.


Please keep in mind that IMDb.com is a free service: our advertisers
help us to continue providing you with great movie information, and
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We obviously do not wish to annoy or alienate our users, and we use a
cookie-based system to strictly limit the number of ads that are
displayed to users during the same session.


Make sure that your browser is configured to accept cookies, which are
used to detect whether you've already been shown a particular ad. If you
get the same ad whenever you open a new page or click on a link,
enabling cookies and restarting your browser should take care of the
problem. If you are worried about privacy, please see our Privacy Policy
at:


http://www.imdb.com/privacy


If you do have cookies enabled and you still get multiple ads/popups,
it's likely that they are not being sent by us. Make sure that you close
ALL your browser windows, shutdown your browser then relaunch it and
try accessing our site again Some ads are designed to be loaded in the
background when you visit a site but are only displayed after a long
delay or when you close the browser window and leave the original site.


Finally, be aware that some ads may be generated by third-party software
installed on your computer. Many free software applications (e.g.
music/file sharing programs) often include hidden components that run in
the background and show pop-up ads at random intervals while you're
browsing the net or display targeted ads based on your browsing habits
or on what you type on a web page.


For more information about these types of software (commonly known as
'spyware' and 'adware') and tools to detect/remove them from your
computer see:


http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/conline/pubs/alerts/sharealrt.htm http://www.google.com/search?&q=spyware

http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10106-108-63806.html


Thank you for your continued support of IMDb.com.