Since the big Update yesterday I am now unable to download updates for Online Virus scanners such as Kaspersky, Norton, PC Cillin etc. Norton says that ActiveX Controls Failed to Download and that Scripting needs to be enabled. I checked “IE6- Tools-Security” and Scripting and ActiveX are enabled. Can someone please advise me how to regain this ability? Thanks.
Which firewall do you use?
If you remove the entry for ashwebsv.exe into the allowed applications and try to start the updates again (allowing it to connect), will it help?
I use the Latest Version of ZoneAlarm and Avast. My settings in both are Unchanged. I want to be clear here, I am not having problems updating Avast. I am unable to update ONLINE SCANNERS such as Kaspersky, HouseCall65, and Norton so I can run their ONLINE Scans. I CAN run PandaScan, F-Secure, ETrust and BitDefender ONLINE Scans successfully, but can no longer run the other ONLINE Scans that have worked for me in the past.
Apparently apologies may be in order to Avast. On a whim I bumped my Internet Explorer6 back one version and now Norton and Kaspersky are updating and running just fine. I had done an IE6 Update a week or two ago, and it is possible that I had not run the Norton or Kaspersky since then. So - Likely was not Avast update that caused my problems. Sorry. :-[
Definitely IE6 and MicroSoft BS. Sorry guys. Just found out that MS has a beef with some company over ActiveX and so their latest releas on IE6 included a “Patch” that screws up the way ActiveX works on certain Websites. I hate MS.
"The Skinny on April’s Batch of Microsoft Patches
Microsoft on Tuesday released five updates to remedy security flaws in its software products, including a huge – and potentially disruptive – patch bundle that fixes eight “critical” flaws in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer Web browser.
The IE patch corrects a flaw that was publicly disclosed three weeks ago and has been used by attackers to install invasive software on machines of tens of thousands of IE users when they merely visited one of hundreds of Web sites that had been seeded with code to exploit the flaw.
Scroll down to the “executive summary” portion of the IE patch details and you’ll find that the roll-up mends no fewer than eight separate security flaws in IE, all of which Redmond awarded its “critical” rating, meaning they could be exploited by attackers to gain complete control over vulnerable PCs without any action on the part of the victim.
[b]But the IE patch isn’t all security updates: It also includes a non-security fix that could make surfing the Web a tad less smooth for IE users. Microsoft first released this particular fix in February as voluntary update (that is, if you use Windows Update or Automatic Updates you wouldn’t have seen this patch before now without some digging) to addresses a patent spat that Microsoft had with Eolas Technologies over the way IE handles ActiveX controls.
Rather than pay to license the process, Microsoft opted to require Web sites that currently use ActiveX to integrate interactive features such as Macromedia Flash, Apple’s QuickTime Player, RealNetworks’s RealPlayer and Adobe’s Reader to redesign their sites to accommodate the fix. Sites that use ActiveX to serve content to IE users but put off making the changes will force those users to generate an extra mouse click to activate those features on the site. [/b]
The changes are likely to most directly affect sites the incorporate ActiveX in their advertisements. But I also experienced the effect of this patch after installing the update and visiting the Web site for the 2006 International Consumer Electronics Show. Visit the page in IE without the patch installed and you’ll see a bunch of fast-moving Macromedia Flash content fly across the screen to the beat of some very loud and obnoxious music that you can silence with a single mouse click on the “audio off” text in the corner of the site’s Window. Do the same with the IE patch installed and you have to click twice to turn off the blaring music.
Also included in this month’s batch of patches is a fix for a critical flaw in Windows Explorer that apparently has been present in every system Microsoft ever produced going back to Windows 98 (Windows Explorer is the core functionality of Windows, in that it provides a nice, clickable, easy to use way for the user to do things like store, retrieve and view files).
PC owners who use Windows 98 Second Edition (Windows SE) or Windows Millennium Edition (Windows ME) may have to wait a while before Microsoft issues a patch that protects them from this flaw. In its advisory, Microsoft said “critical security updates for these platforms may not be available concurrently with the other security updates provided as part of this security bulletin. They will be made available as soon as possible following the release. When these security updates are available, you will be able to download them only from the Windows Update Web site.”
Another patch issued Tuesday corrects a critical flaw in an ActiveX control that attackers could use to break into Windows machines if users visited a Web site designed to leverage the flaw. This flaw also is present in versions of Windows dating back to Windows 98, and in this case Microsoft managed to offer the patch to those users to cover this flaw.
Finally, Microsoft released updates to fix a ‘moderate’ flaw in its FrontPage Web design software, as well as a “cumulative update” for Outlook Express, an e-mail program installed by default on Windows computers.
While the Outlook Express flaws also exist in Windows 98SE and Windows ME, Microsoft does not plan to issue fixes for those systems because the patch earned just an “important” rating from Redmond, its second-most serious (Microsoft said a while back that it would only issue security updates for non-supported operating systems if the flaw earned a “critical” rating.)
Microsoft labels a flaw “important” if its exploitation “could result in compromise of the confidentiality, integrity, or availability of users data, or of the integrity or availability of processing resources.” By contrast, a flaw is designated “critical” if its exploitation “could allow the propagation of an Internet worm without user action.” The key distinction between the two here appears to be “user action,” which I can only imagine might include such onerous actions as visiting a malicious Web site or opening a specially crafted e-mail."