Update available for Foxit PDF reader

A new version, possibly with a fix to a critical bug, has just been released.

Michael Horowitz

Michael Horowitz wrote his first computer program in 1973 and has been a computer nerd ever since. He spent more than 20 years working in an IBM mainframe (MVS) environment. He has worked in the research and development group of a large Wall Street financial company, and has been a technical writer for a mainframe software company.

He teaches a large range of self-developed classes, the underlying theme being Defensive Computing. Michael is an independent computer consultant, working with small businesses and the self-employed. He can be heard weekly on The Personal Computer Show on WBAI.

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Michael Horowitz

May 26, 2008 8:59 p.m. PT

Foxit software just released a new version of its Adobe Acrobat PDF file reader. The previous version was 2.3 build 2825. The new version is still 2.3 but the build number is now 2923.

Although there is nothing about it on Foxit's Web site, the company confirmed on the phone that this is a bug-fix release.

On May 20, Secunia issued an advisory that pointed out what it called a "highly critical" bug in the prior version. Secunia expected a fix from Foxit in an upcoming version of the software, however, as of 12:15 p.m. EDT on Sunday May 25th (roughly two days after the software was released), Secunia still lists the bug as unpatched.
Update May 26, 2008: Secunia has confirmed that the bug they wrote about is fixed in this release.

If you use the portable version of Foxit, as I suggested back on May 6, then simply download the Zip file again and delete the older version. If you use the normally installed edition of Foxit, then you can check for updates with Help -> Check for Updates Now. The new version will show up as "Foxit Reader 2.3.2008.2923 Upgrade" if you are running the previous version. If you don't use Foxit at all, give it a try.

The Foxit servers appear to be swamped. I experienced multiple failures both checking for updates from within the program and trying to download the Zip file.

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