How in the Tech

Nuke Firefox 3’s Automatic Virus Scanning

By Adam Myers ⋅ November 19, 2008 ⋅ Tags: anti-virus, firefox, firefox 3, firefox anti-virus, firefox tips

Were you aware that Firefox 3 included a built-in virus scanner? Well, technically it doesn’t I suppose, but it does include hooks that call your installed anti-virus scanner for all files that you download through Firefox’s download manager. You probably don’t see the scanning progress because the message occurs in the  download manager that is hidden by default – I know I never did until I had it open at the completion of a download.

This feature sounds great on paper, and I commend Mozilla’s good intentions, but in my situation, and I suspect yours as well, it really isn’t necessary. You see, almost all anti-virus software provide real-time scanning and in turn, would already be scanning the bits that come across your network connection. Worse, the scan tends to cause delays and freezes while it scans large downloads. It is because of these reasons that I sought out a way to disable the feature. It’s commonplace to uncover hidden features and preferences in Firefox’s about:config, so it was no shock to me that this tweak lies there too.

1. In a new Firefox window/tab, type about:config in the address bar.



2. From the Filter box, type browser.download.manager.scanWhenDone.



3. Double click on the result and the value will change from true to false. A setting of false will disable the virus scan that occurs at the completion of a download.

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