Avatar for Username

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

Firefox "check for add-on updates" checks even when not selected, request website list for firewall blocking purposes

  • 1 reply
  • 1 has this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by John99

bmcguire
bmcguire
more options

I work for the Tech Department in a school district. Our student computers are locked down and all settings are reset after a restart. We have set firefox to always allow all add-ons to run and to never check for updates (we update them on a schedule we control). However, since the latest release, we have been prompted after EVERY flash AND EVERY java update that they are out of date and need to be updated. Having the students click on this every time for every affected webpage is no longer an option. We are also not interested in white-listing pages individually; instead, we would like to prevent firefox from finding the update server to prevent any further prompts.

Please provide me with all of the websites/web addresses that "check for add-on updates" uses so we can block them at the firewall level.

Thanks

I work for the Tech Department in a school district. Our student computers are locked down and all settings are reset after a restart. We have set firefox to always allow all add-ons to run and to never check for updates (we update them on a schedule we control). However, since the latest release, we have been prompted after EVERY flash AND EVERY java update that they are out of date and need to be updated. Having the students click on this every time for every affected webpage is no longer an option. We are also not interested in white-listing pages individually; instead, we would like to prevent firefox from finding the update server to prevent any further prompts. Please provide me with all of the websites/web addresses that "check for add-on updates" uses so we can block them at the firewall level. Thanks

All Replies (1)

John99
John99
more options

Part of the problem may be the recent flurry of required updates to FlashPlayer. As I understand it Mozilla took the exceptional step of blocklisting some of those FlashPlayer versions after fixes were released because there were known exploits in the wild.

Possibly you are having difficulty in keeping the software updated and so seeing valid warnings from Firefox. You appear (System info aside) to be posting using Firefox 34. The current Release is Fx35.0.1

Possibly it would be worth you considering using Firefox ESR, that still has regular updates including backported critical security fixes, but the major version stays the same for longer and there are less frequent feature changes.

I will send links for a couple of other articles by Private Message. Steps that may be safe for an IT department may not be recommended for the average reader of this forum.