Adobe Flash is a plugin for Internet Explorer and Firefox that allows active content to be displayed in your web browser. As with other third party programs, its updated on a regular basis. In many cases, the Flash Security Update KB923789 in Windows Update would not install properly. In other cases, you may have received an error “you must install a later version of the Macromedia Flash Player”.

In April 2008, Adobe is releasing another security update that may cause issues too. Because of these problems, you may have to uninstall and reinstall the flash player to may it work properly. Follow the steps below to download the Flash Player Uninstaller and then reinstall it. In most cases, a reinstall will fix any issues with Flash Player.

Last week, a hacked flash ad injected into online advertising enabled malware to attack systems just by visitors viewing the infected web page.  These “malvertisements” may become commonplace in the future and are even more reason to uninstall any old versions of Adobe Flash Player and install the latest version. Read more about Flash Security further down the page.

Download the Adobe Flash Player Uninstaller

Many times, just uninstalling and reinstalling the Adobe Flash Player from the Add/Remove Programs Control Panel will not solve the problem. If the Flash Player is corrupted, it may not remove properly and therefore an new installations will not proceed correctly. Click on the following link to download the Adobe Flash Player Uninstaller and save it to your desktop.

http://www.adobe.com/shockwave/download/alternates/

Run the uninstaller program and then reboot your computer to complete the uninstall.

Download the latest version of Flash Player

Now that Adobe Flash has been uninstalled, go to the Adobe site and download the latest flash player.

http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer

Security Level Issues Won’t Allow Flash Player to Download

Sometimes, browser security will not allow you to download the Flash Player correctly. If this happens in Internet Explorer, check the following items to allow the download.

To change your security level:

1. Open Internet Explorer.
2. Click on Tools, Internet Options
3. Click on the Security Tab
4. Click Custom Level
5. Find the section titled “ActiveX controls and plug-ins”
6. Choose Prompt for “Download Signed ActiveX Controls”
7. Choose Prompt for “Run ActiveX Controls and Plug-ins”
8. Click OK twice to close the options screen

More Troubleshooting Help for Flash Player

If this procedure does not allow you to install Adobe Flash, you may want to visit the Troubleshooting FAQ on Adobe’s site.

Flash Security

Because of the recent vulnerabilities found in Flash applications that allow malware code to be released when a flash file is viewed, you may want to turn flash off when viewing flash enabled websites. This is a more extreme measure, but should be considered.

Here are some utilities that will help turn flash off when needed.

For Internet Explorer:

• TurnFlash – a utility to turn flash on or off from the system tray
• No! Flash – free utility to disable flash, java, and more

For Firefox:

• FlashBlock – an add-on extension to block flash, shockwave, and authorware in Firefox

To read more about this flash vulnerability visit the Windows Secrets article

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