To those of you reading, keep on using Safari or whatever it is. Your only real protection here is a firewall. Here's why...

Wow, if this isn't just silly...

What exactly could NOT be used in conjunction with bugs in Windows and IE? If someone has their system compromised at the shell level, then their problem clearly isn't with Safari. There are plenty of other nasty things that could be done through these things that wouldn't even begin to include Safari.

Not using Safari in this case is like plugging up a single hole on your swiss cheese boat. It doesn't solve the underlying issue and it does not make you any safer.

I'm sure someone has mentioned this here, but the exploit allows a file to be copied to your download folder without your permission. The second half of the exploit relies on OTHER exploits to run the file. That means your computer has to be compromised in addition to this exploit being performed before it is of any concern.

Of course, it could be the most malicious program ever written, but if no one can execute it, then no one needs to worry. Your personal safety is up to you and whether or not your system is reasonably secure (firewall & antivirus).

Nobody is saying you are unqualified for the Security forum. And since you are helping an immense number of people in there it would be a shame for you to get upset and quit because a couple people disagree with your position on this.

But here is the facts once again. The exploit for Safari has been publically released, it still isn't found 'in the wild', and no patch has been released since Apple doesn't think it is a big deal because the user can just change the default download directory and the exploit is gone. The only way this can actually mess you up is if you got some malicious executables through the exploit, then either you ran those yourself, or you got hit also by the IE/Windows problems. That seems extremely unlikely, and even at that it would still have to get past your AntiVirus.

Now the FF one, its undisclosed, which is fine because it hasn't been publically released, but we have no idea how bad it is, or who all knows about it. But it too hasn't been found 'in the wild' yet. As of now we don't know the potential harm from it, and that should induce some caution.

Based on this, I would expect you to also say you wouldn't recommend using Firefox until it is patched just as you did with Safari. But in essence you can patch the Safari one yourself. Then there is absolutely no harm in running Safari still.

So the way I see it, you can change the dl directory for Safari and be safe from that problem. The Firefox issue we have no idea how harmless or harmful it could be, so if anything, Firefox should be the one you don't use until it is fixed.

I suspect that you have some passion behind Firefox, you've used it for quite some time, and with good reason left IE5 or IE6. I feel the same about Opera. But I also suspect there is some anti Apple behind this as well because I don't see how you can take the stance you did with Safari and not here with Firefox. Your statement when you first brought this up was "Safari has been hit hard lately by the malware writers." when that really isn't true because nobody has even seen this happening. I pointed that out in my first reply after you posted.

I'm just trying to defend a browser here that has few defenders. This is nothing personal against you, I would have posted my same replies to anyone else.