Last Updated on 22/11/2021 by Anamika
Firefox users were using, or rather abusing proxy API to block Firefox updates. Recently, Mozilla blocked malicious add-ons of more than 450000 users.
According to reports, the add-ons namely Bypass and Bypass XM were using the API to intercept and redirect web requests to block users from downloading updates, updating remotely configured content, and accessing updated blocklists.
Bleeping Computer’s report state, “To prevent additional users from being impacted by new add-on submissions misusing the proxy API, we paused on approvals for add-ons that used the proxy API until fixes were available for all users,” Mozilla’s Rachel Tublitz and Stuart Colville said.
According to Mozilla, users are advised to update their browsers to the recent version which is Firefox 93, and claims that this version will help them to be protected from add-ons making the proxy API vulnerable.
If the users have not run Firefox 93 and have not disabled browser updates, they could be impacted by this issue. To make sure this doesn’t happen, try to update Firefox to the latest versions since it bundles an updated blocklist designed to disable these malicious add-ons automatically.
If the users want to ensure that there are no traces left, you can also refresh Firefox to reset all add-ons and settings or start from scratch by downloading and installing a new copy of Firefox.