Mozilla released is Firefox Version 16 this week, 9 October, however the updated browser had to be pulled from the Web over security concerns just a day after its launch.
It is not known when Mozilla became aware of the problem, or how it was discovered, but it has been described as a ‘vulnerability’ which could allow malicious websites to capture a person’s web history.
Michael Coates, Mozilla's director of security assurance, explained in a blog: "Mozilla is aware of a security vulnerability in the current release version of Firefox. We are actively working on a fix and plan to ship updates. Firefox version 15 is unaffected."
In addition, Coates advised: “Downgrade to version 15.0.1. Alternatively, users can wait until our patches are issued and automatically applied to address the vulnerability.”
The company today detailed the security fixes in an updated version of its open source browser, including fixing 14 security holes, 11 of which it rated as critical.