Installation of Adobe CS3 component (Version Cue) can disable Mac OS X firewall

[Published Thursday, May 17th]

For some time now we've been following an issue where Adobe CS3 installation turns off the Mac OS X Firewall and turns on TCP access to ports 3703, 3704, 50900 and 50901 without notifying the user

As noted by readers of the Web site MacInTouch, Version Cue is the culpable component in turning off the firewall. One user tested this by deselecting "VersionCue Server" when installing CS3, resulting in Firewall settings being unchanged.

This issue has now been identified a security flaw by research firm Secunia, installation of Adobe Creative Suite 3.0 -- specifically the Version Cue component -- can result in the Mac OS X firewall being disabled.

The Secunia advisory states:

"During installation on a Mac system, the application disables the Mac OS X personal firewall to set up certain ports to allow controlled access through the firewall service. The problem is that the firewall is not re-enabled once the setup is finished. This may leave certain system services open to attacks."

The simple solution is to re-enable the Mac OS X firewall if it has been disabled by CS3 installation. This can be accomplished via the following steps:

1. Open System Preferences
2. Click on the Sharing pane
3. Click on the Firewall tab
4. Click the Start button under Firewall (On/Off)

Feedback? Late-breakers@macfixit.com.

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