Mozilla's Firefox 1.0.7 has taken top spot in a list of vulnerable applications likely to be lurking in corporate IT systems released by Bit9.

The endpoint security vendor contends that malware is less of a threat to companies than unpatched off-the-shelf applications deployed throughout their organisations.

Firefox 1.0.7 is number one on its list, with vulnerabilities including "memory corruptions, buffer overflows, and running of arbitrary HTML and Javascript code that in many cases allow the execution of arbitrary code".

Apple's iTunes 6.0.2 and Quicktime 7.0.3 come second, with Skype Internet Phone 1.4 third, Acrobat Reader 7.02/6.03 fourth, and Sun's Java Run-Time Environment 5.0 rounding out the top five.

Security hounds may be surprised that Microsoft doesn't make an appearance till number nine, with Microsoft Windows/MSN messenger 5.0. Then again, Microsoft's software could be a bit more widespread than anything else in the top 15.

It should be said that Bit9 doesn't make it clear if it has ranked the apps by their popularity or their level of vulnerability.

Bit9 says companies should take a hard line against unauthorised apps, and should completely disable them, rather than simply blocking them. ®

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