author: Bart Swiatek
Firefox 69 will disable Flash
Firefox will stop supporting the Adobe Flash plugin, beginning with is being disabled by default from build 69 onwards.
IN A NUTSHELL:
- From September 2019, Firefox will disable the Adobe Flash plug-in by default, later versions of the browser will also prevent us from turning it back on;
- In mid-2020, support will be dropped in ESR releases;
- In 2021 Flash Player will be completely blocked by Mozilla.
This year, Mozilla Firefox will stop supporting the Adobe Flash plug-in. This will happen on September 3, with the release of the version 69 of the browser. It is worth noting that approximately one year later (in 2020) Flash will also be abandoned by its creators, so Mozilla's decision is anticipatory – its goal is to provide adequate security for users.
Initially, Mozilla's developers did not plan to give up Adobe Flash support this year – the browser was supposed to continue to support the technology, displaying only messages informing the users that the site was using the plug-in. In the end, a different approach was chosen, as it was considered (probably rightly so) that continuous messages would only create unnecessary confusion.
It is worth noting that Firefox version 69, will still allow us to enable Flash Player support manually in the settings (the function will simply be disabled by default). The consumer versions of Mozilla will lose this option at the beginning of 2020, and a few months later, the functionality will also be deprived of ESR (Extended Support Release). In 2021 the plug-in will be completely blocked.
Google and Microsoft also plan to stop using Adobe Flash in their browsers. Thus, this technology will join other abandoned NPAPI (Netscape Plugin Application Programming Interface) plug-ins, such as Silverlight or Java. The reasons for this state of affairs can be traced back to the constant development of technology. In the past, these solutions were necessary to display certain types of objects on websites. Nowadays the plugins do not offer anything that modern browsers are not able to do on their own, and without unnecessarily exposing our computer to threats (the plugins create an additional software layer, which may reveal security holes).