Title

Firefox updates must not run in the background. (Cat II impact)

Discussion

It is detrimental for applications to provide, or install by default, functionality exceeding requirements or mission objectives. These unnecessary capabilities or services are often overlooked and therefore may remain unsecured. They increase the risk to the platform by providing additional attack vectors. Applications are capable of providing a wide variety of functions and services. Some of the functions and services, provided by default, may not be necessary to support essential organizational operations (e.g., key missions, functions). Examples of non-essential capabilities include but are not limited to advertising software or browser plug-ins that are not related to requirements or provide a wide array of functionality not required for every mission but that cannot be disabled.

Check Content

Type "about:policies" in the browser address bar. If "BackgroundAppUpdate" is not displayed under Policy Name or the Policy Value is not "false", this is a finding. Note: This is a Windows-only control. For other operating systems, this requirement is Not Applicable.

Fix Text

Windows group policy: 1. Open the group policy editor tool with "gpedit.msc". 2. Navigate to Policy Path: Computer Configuration\Administrative Templates\Mozilla\Firefox\ Policy Name: Background Updater Policy State: Disabled

Additional Identifiers

Rule ID: SV-251579r807209_rule

Vulnerability ID: V-251579

Group Title: SRG-APP-000141

Expert Comments

CCIs tied to check.

Controls tied to check. These are derived from the CCIs shown above.