"Imagine if the Firefox team snuck in an addition to Internet Explorer. I bet the lawsuits would already be flying"

Sorry, this is complete rubbish. People produce extensions for IE all the time, the difference is that Microsoft users don't rant on like this, they are much more mature.

People! Read the add-on screenshot above carefully. I think the problem is that it is poor naming. This is an add-on from Click-Once called "Microsoft .Net Framework Assistant 1.0" that allows Click-Once to remotely detect the local .Net framework version via Firefox. That's all. Nothing to blame M$ for... The add-on & installation behaviour are all down to Click-Once.

But it just goes to show, you can never really be sure what you're PC is actually running...esp. when browsing the web.

To Ron Anon: My point here is two fold. First Click Once is hardly malicious software, and it will have no impact on Firefox's performance or behavior other than enabling Click Once for the user. Second the Author should have done his own research and reported on what Click Once actually is; instead of jumping to the wild conclusions that he came up with. Unfortunately his laziness appears to be infectious. Most of the people on this post are jumping to conclusions without doing any proper research. It's clear that most of these comments are motivated by an uninformed hatred of Microsoft. Someone even posted that this akin to what Microsoft did to the JVM, but it isn't anything like that. Microsoft is merely using Firefox's plug in capabilities to support their .Net platform. It's not like this is Microsoft's attempt to re-implement Firefox and undermine its capabilities (we can look at IE for something more akin to that). Don't get me wrong Microsoft can be downright dirty sometimes, and we should call them on it when they are, but we should do so in an informed fashion. This post isn't informative, and it wouldn't have taken much effort on the writer's part to make this post informative for its readers. As for Click Once being silently installed, I'm going to say that's a tough one, as it doesn't adversely affect the user experience. In fact Click Once is necessary for Microsoft to cultivate development on its .Net platform, which is the recommended platform for windows based applications. Clearly Microsoft ought to support application development on its own platform, and clearly the user is ok with running windows applications on their Windows machines, or they would be running a different OS. It should be noted that Click Once applications do not run in the browser, they are installed and run locally on the user's machine. In that sense this is more akin to the silent updates Microsoft does with their .Net framework. That being said there's definitely a legitimate argument to be made against the silent install. Of course if you're worried about silent updates then just check what's coming down in your automatic updates first.

Microsoft didn't install this into my Firefox. And I have a fully updated Windows XP with every .NET Framework imaginable.

Quite amazing to me how quickly you blind lemmings can go from 0-60 when a chance for you to whine about anything Microsoft come to light. Nothing has been proven or discovered about this code yet the witch hunters are out doing what they do best. Hunting prey that they know nothing about.

To Edgar Harris:
o Then why be sneaky about it?
o Why not say so on your download page?
o Why not ask for permission or inform the users when it's installed?
o Why not make it easy to uninstall?
o WHY DO I HAVE TO SEARCH GOOGLE TO FIND OUT WHAT MICRO$OFT ARE INSTALLING ON MY PC???

Talk about making a mountain out of a mole hill. A quick google search would tell you that Click Once is a mechanism that allows you to easily install thick desktop applications with auto update capabilities from the Web. It makes sense that a browser plug-in is required for this feature; since you install a Click Once application through a link on the vendors site and then run through the install process.

... Why is sasa k talking about the PlayStation 3, Firefox browser is for PC/Mac/Linux, not XMB...

And why the hell you would you even try to install a .NET framework on Ubuntu... Bruce

Some people should of stay on Windows, as for my FF is to slow to use as it is so slowing it down more doesn't affect me.

I use Safari now, i prefer it's simplicity.

Only thing is, if I wanna visit www.microsoft.com, I need to use Explorer instead, and the same thing goes if I wanna play the games at www.zone.com (another MS site)

I've installed Firefox at least 3 times, and as much as I try to like it, I ususally remove it within 10 minutes of installation.

Anyone remember Java? Here we go again. Another example of how a M$ Monopoly kills innovation and keeps us all down. Enough already. Do all you can to promote non M$ software and solutions like the rest of us. That is the only way to weaken these greedy lost causes.

I wouldn't be surprised if Microsoft add more and more components into it, to eventually screw FireFox up. Im guessing there view on EVERYTHING is DESTROY THE COMPETITION. There is no such thing as a Virus. But if you think there is, what is actually the virus? The program, or the Operating system that executes it....

Have a look at your Plug-ins sometime. Office 2007 adds a plugin, but these "sneak installations" aren't limited to Microsoft.

Isn't Firefox open source software? I thought it was ok for people to add to it however they wish.

now that they got cought, microsoft will claim they did not know anything about it and was done by someone else. some kid said he found out some inside info that their main focus was to slow down/destroy the ps3 through its web browser. i hope this is true, microsoft needs to burn. garbage company fueled by greed and money.

Will M$ be trying to do this to my Ubuntu O/S ?

It would not be surprising if they did.

Will M$ be trying to do this to my Ubuntu O/S ?

It would not be surprising if they did.