Pale Moon Version 33.0.0 Released with Security Updates

  Pale Moon has been updated to version 33.0.0.  This is a milestone update.  The update involves over 250 commits, the most important of which are below..

The primary focus for this milestone is web compatibility, in particular Regular Expression extensions, standards compliance issues and further JPEG-XL support.  This milestone now offers full coverage of the ECMAScript 2016-2020 JavaScript specifications, with the exception of BigInt primitives.

New features:

• Implemented a restricted version of the asynchronous clipboard API (navigator.clipboard). This API is restricted to writing only for obvious security considerations. It supports both plaintext and the standard DataTransfer methods. We did not implement the reinvented wheel concept of ClipboardItem objects.
• Implemented support for SHA-2 (SHA-256/SHA-512/etc.) signatures for OCSP stapled responses.
• Implemented an option (Found in Preferences -> Content -> Media tab (new this version)) to restrict DOM full-screen mode to the existing browser window.
• Implemented several options in a new preferences tab (Preference -> Privacy -> Tracking) to allow users to more easily control several privacy-impacting features, namely poisoning of canvas data (to prevent fingerprinting), and enabling of Performance observers (a developer feature) that some websites rely on for their operation.
• Implemented PromiseRejectionEvent. Although this is rarely actually used, some common JS libraries (you know who you are!) use it as a feature level canary and start loading (broken!) Promise shims if it is not found, causing compatibility issues and broken websites due to the shims.

Fixes:

• Aligned microtasks and Promises scheduling with the current spec and expected behavior.
• We now no longer send click events to top levels of the document hierarchy when using non-primary buttons (use auxclick, instead, to capture these events).
• Greatly improved the performance of box shadows.
• Greatly improved the performance of file/data uploads over HTTP/2 (most of the secure websites out there).
• Fixed several issues related to focus and content selection.
• Fixed issues with the use of focus-within caused by unexpected processing of DOM events.
• Fixed an issue with CSP not behaving as-expected when using importScripts(), and fixed a number of additional CSP-related issues.
• Fixed a web compatibility issue with CORS preflights not sending the original request's referrer policy or referrer header.
• Fixed a spec compliance issue with StructuredClone.
• Fixed a crash due to clamping code introduced for SetInterval and SetTimeout timers.
• Fixed crashes when dynamic imports are canceled (e.g. by navigation).

Other changes:

• Changed <input type=file> to now have its .files property be writable following a spec change and recommendation.
• We are now requiring and building against the C++17 language standard.
• Updated the in-tree ffvpx lib to 6.0.
• Added a preference to allow users to completely disable reporting of CSP errors to webmasters. Using this is strongly discouraged as it will provide essential troubleshooting information to webmasters setting up CSP, and does not pose a privacy issue, but for those who really want it, it can now be fully disabled. The preference is security.csp.reporting.enabled.
• Updated the IntersectionObserver interface to now also accept documents for the observer root instead of only HTML elements.
• Cleaned up various bits of code surrounding GMP, memory allocation, system libraries, vestigial Android code, freetype2 and developer tools.
• Improved efficiency of handling D3D textures.
• Added initial and experimental Mac PowerPC and Big Endian support.
• Changed the behavior of hung scripts. We now automatically terminate them instead of presenting the user with a dialog box (which may or may not show in a reasonable time if the browser is too busy trying to process the hung script). If you prefer the old behavior, uncheck the box "Automatically stop non-responsive scripts" in Preferences -> Content -> General
• Security issues addressed: CVE-2024-0746, CVE-2024-0741, CVE-2024-0743 DiD, CVE-2024-0750 DiD, and CVE-2024-0753.
• UXP Mozilla security patch summary: 3 fixed, 2 DiD, 12 not applicable.
  

*DiD: This means that a fix is "Defense-in-Depth": It is a fix that does not apply to a (potentially) actively exploitable vulnerability in Pale Moon, but prevents future vulnerabilities caused by the same code, e.g. when surrounding code changes, exposing the problem, or when new attack vectors are discovered.

**Rejected security patches: This means that patches were theoretically applicable to our code but considered undesirable, which could be due to unwanted changes in behavior, known regressions caused by the patches, or unnecessary risks for stability, security or privacy.

Pale Moon includes both 32- and 64-bit versions for Windows: Pale Moon for Windows downloads.

Update: To get the update now, select "Help" from the Pale Moon menu at the upper left of the browser window.  Select About Pale Moon > Check for Updates.

Release Notes
Release Cycle

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