It's time to uninstall Adobe's Flash from your Mac - here's how
The recent tidal wave of critical vulnerabilities in Adobe's Flash Player has prompted many security professionals to call for the much-maligned software's demise, and we agree. AppleInsider shows you how to uninstall Flash from your Mac, and what to do if you can't live without it.
TL;DR -- If you're running OS X 10.6 or later, download and run this Flash uninstaller. If you have OS X 10.4 or 10.5, use this uninstaller instead.
Adobe has patched more than twenty Flash vulnerabilities in the last week --?some of them days after active exploits were discovered in the wild --?and issued over a dozen Flash Player security advisories since the beginning of this year. Flash has become such an information security nightmare that Facebook's Chief Security Officer called on Adobe to sunset the platform as soon as possible and ask browser vendors to forcibly kill it off.
Though most exploits are targeted at Windows, Mac users are not invincible. Thankfully, Flash is easy to remove and most of your favorite sites and Web services will continue to work fine without Flash installed. YouTube, Netflix, and a host of others have either made the shift to HTML5 video or use alternative technologies, like Microsoft's Silverlight.
If you can't or won't install Chrome, a good fallback is Marc Hoyois's ClickToFlash plugin for Safari. It will prevent any Flash content from running until you explicitly authorize it by clicking a placeholder in the page.
If you insist on keeping Flash installed and won't use ClickToFlash, at the very least make sure Flash can update itself automatically by enabling automatic updates in System Preferences → Flash Player. Then perhaps you should take a long, hard look at your life choices.
TL;DR -- If you're running OS X 10.6 or later, download and run this Flash uninstaller. If you have OS X 10.4 or 10.5, use this uninstaller instead.
Adobe has patched more than twenty Flash vulnerabilities in the last week --?some of them days after active exploits were discovered in the wild --?and issued over a dozen Flash Player security advisories since the beginning of this year. Flash has become such an information security nightmare that Facebook's Chief Security Officer called on Adobe to sunset the platform as soon as possible and ask browser vendors to forcibly kill it off.
Though most exploits are targeted at Windows, Mac users are not invincible. Thankfully, Flash is easy to remove and most of your favorite sites and Web services will continue to work fine without Flash installed. YouTube, Netflix, and a host of others have either made the shift to HTML5 video or use alternative technologies, like Microsoft's Silverlight.
How to uninstall Flash from your Mac
- Verify your OS X version by clicking the Apple icon in the upper left and selecting About This Mac.
- For OS X 10.5 and later --?Snow Leopard, Mountain Lion, Mavericks, or Yosemite --?download and run this uninstaller.
- For OS X 10.4 and 10.5 --?Tiger or Leopard --?download and run this uninstaller
Dear Flash pic.twitter.com/lYnzOAvNF0
— InfoSec Taylor (@SwiftOnSecurity) What to do if you need Flash
If you find yourself with absolutely no choice but to use Flash --?maybe you have a Flash-based business application --?the safest course of action is to install Google Chrome. Chrome includes a special version of Flash that runs inside a sandbox, with updates handled by Google.If you can't or won't install Chrome, a good fallback is Marc Hoyois's ClickToFlash plugin for Safari. It will prevent any Flash content from running until you explicitly authorize it by clicking a placeholder in the page.
If you insist on keeping Flash installed and won't use ClickToFlash, at the very least make sure Flash can update itself automatically by enabling automatic updates in System Preferences → Flash Player. Then perhaps you should take a long, hard look at your life choices.
Comments
Chrome isn't a solution either, as this most recent big exploit also proved it is vulnerable.
I've been Flash free since February. Best thing ever.
You can easily play content in Safari by going to the Develop menu > User Agent > Safari iOS x.x - iPad. Since iOS devices don't use Flash many websites fall back to HTML5 content for mobile devices, so tricking a website into thinking it's running on an iPad should load the HTML5 content. Works fine for me for playing Flash video on many sites.
Chrome isn't a solution either, as this most recent big exploit also proved it is vulnerable.
I've been Flash free since February. Best thing ever.
As far as I'm aware, they busted the Chrome sandbox by piggybacking on a Windows 0day; Google mitigated within hours. Chrome is still the best option by far if you must use Flash.
Why is that better than the Click to Flash option in Safari ? ... I'm genuinely curious not disagreeing. I tried Chrome for ten minutes but Little Snitch lit up like a Christmas tree with all the out going data connections to Google and others. I removed it immediately.
Why is that better than the Click to Flash option in Safari ... genuinely curious not disagreeing.
For the same reason that it's safer for police officers to handcuff someone and place them in the squad car, rather than let them stand around outside: even if they slip the cuffs, they're still contained.
Thank you for reminding me to update my Flash. After reading it I just went straight and installed it.
I was just going to say, the real question is why the hell is Google towing this junk truck along behind them… looks like I now have the answer…
The sad thing is, you're probably right. It's the same reason I had to learn Rhino instead of SolidWorks in school. It's because that's what the professor knew, and so that's what got taught. I could have taken the SolidWorks elective, but it never came around at the right time. Oh well, my company just bought a few seats of SolidWorks so it's all good I guess
Got rid of it a long time ago. If I go to a website that requires Flash then I simply stop visiting them.