Firefox 85 is the new stable version of the free web browser and comes with two new features of interest, the expected removal of Adobe Flash and protection against supercookies.
Adobe Flash is dead and well dead and the providers that have been using it are giving it the last condolences. Firefox 85 no longer supports Flash content and there is no way to enable it. At least officially, because in other browsers such as Chrome, which have also removed it, there are extensions that can enable it.
Protection against supercookies is a surprise
If removal of Adobe Flash was expected, perhaps the biggest news comes as the protection against supercookies for Firefox. This is the latest in a series of steps taken by the Mozilla foundation to incorporate privacy features to your web browser.
Mozilla has been blocking cookies from trackers and scripts from companies that use “fingerprinting” to create a profile of individual users to track your behavior as you browse the web, often for the purpose of delivering targeted advertising.
However, “supercookies” hide in different parts of the browser and tend to track activity by looking at cached data in the browser. Firefox 85 does not completely block the downloading of these supercookies, but it limits their ability to track your web browsing by creating separate browser caches for each website you visit. This means that if a cookie is hidden, for example, in a cached image from one website, it won’t be able to track you when you visit a different website.
Firefox 85 also includes fixes for known bugs, the latest security patches, an option to delete all saved logins with a single click, or improved bookmark functionality.
How to update to Firefox 85?
Windows, Mac and Linux Firefox users can update to the latest version from Options -> Help -> About Firefox. The browser will automatically check for the new update and install it over the previous one. New users or those who want to install from scratch can download the new version from Mozilla’s website. It has options for 32-bit or 64-bit Windows x86, Windows ARM64, macOS or 32-bit and 64-bit Linux.
With the release of Firefox 85, the other development branches have uploaded a version that brings Firefox Beta to edition 86 and Nightly that compiles to version 87.
