389672 - Popup Blocker does not block Popunder windows.

Status: RESOLVED FIXED

(Firefox :: General, defect)

Description

[Ken Standard]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9a7pre) Gecko/2007072605 Minefield/3.0a7pre
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9a7pre) Gecko/2007072605 Minefield/3.0a7pre

The popup blocker does not block popunder windows. There needs to be a enhancement to the popup blocker to also block popunder windows.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.visit web site
2.popunder windows will appear
3.close firefox


Expected Results:  
The popup blocker needs to block all forms of pop up or pop under windows. Both are very annoying.

This should be true for all versions on all platforms.

Comment 1

[Ria Klaassen (not reading all bugmail)]

Works for me with Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9a7pre) Gecko/2007072607 Minefield/3.0a7pre
I see two blocked pop-up messages. 
Is the value of privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins set to 2 in about:config?
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Privacy.popups.disable_from_plugins
http://kb.mozillazine.org/About:config

Comment 2

[Ken Standard]

The pop UP windows do get blocked. But many sites send pop UNDER windows to get around the popup blocker. Both should be blocked.

Comment 3

[Jesse Ruderman]

WFM on Mac.  I tested trunk and Firefox 2.0.0.5.  I see a nasty lawyer ad that overlays part of the page and has sound, but no unrequested windows.

"Pop under" windows work the same way as pop up windows except that they have a window.focus() call, so this isn't a matter of "sites getting around the popup blocker by using popunders instead".  It's a matter of figuring out how this specific site is able to open unrequested windows.  Since we can't reproduce the bug, you'll need to make a reduced testcase or figure out what's different about your setup that causes you to see them when we don't.

Comment 4

[Ken Standard]

The popunder add appears when you click on a link like the weather center or Doppler radar. I tried it again this morning and it is definitely still there. It allows a zedo popunder every time. There is also a very real difference in popup and popunder windows (more than just focus). If the popup blocker is only concentrating on top focus windows, this is a woeful limitation.

As a user, I do not have direct access to any selectable parameter that would likely allow this kind of selective filtering of popup windows. If it is a problem with configuration, it comes with the defaults generated by selecting the options in the setup dialog. I have not modified the About:config file at all.

I brought this problem to attention because there are third-party popup blockers out there that have specific filters for both and I do not think Firefox is less capable of doing it as well.

Comment 5

[Marco Bonardo [:mak] (Away Apr 25 - May 5)]

i have been able to see a popup here, with branch and trunk, after visiting the site (for the first time) and clicking on pinpoint doppler. it's hwv not easy to reproduce

Comment 6

[Jesse Ruderman]

> The popunder add appears when you click on a link like the weather center or
> Doppler radar. I tried it again this morning and it is definitely still there.

Oh, you should have said that in the steps to reproduce in comment 0 then :)  

I don't think Firefox can block onclick popups without breaking half of the web; see bug 212163.  (This bug is probably a dup of bug 212163.)

FWIW, I clicked "PinPoint Dopper" a few times and only got one extra window, one showing a doppler map.  (Using Firefox trunk on Mac.)

> There is also a very real difference in popup and popunder windows (more than 
> just focus). If the popup blocker is only concentrating on top focus windows,
> this is a woeful limitation.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

Comment 7

[James Darpinian]

I think the real problem here is that Firefox is ignoring the dom.disable_window_flip pref, allowing sites to produce popunders even when the "Allow scripts to raise and lower windows" checkbox is cleared (as it is by default).  I've just added a testcase to Bug 369306 illustrating the problem.  If that was fixed, these popunders would turn into normal popups, which would be even more annoying in the short term but hopefully sites would quickly remove the ads, at least for Firefox users, as most sites have learned by now that users hate popups.

Comment 8

[Tyler Downer [He/Him]]

This is a mass search for bugs which are in the Firefox General component, are
UNCO, have not been changed for 500 days and have an unspecified version. 

Reporter, can you please update to Firefox 3.6.10 or later, create a fresh profile, http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/managing+profiles, and test again. If you still see the issue, please update this bug. If the issue is gone, please set the status to RESOLVED > WORKSFORME.

Comment 11

[Frank Yan (:fryn)]

One way to mitigate this is to do nothing on calls to window.focus() or window.blur(). I haven't found a single site that uses this API for anything other than popunders. I filed bug 610562 for this. If it's confirmed to be a decent idea, I might pick it up.

Comment 12

[Jesse Ruderman]

Between bug 369306 being fixed and bug 212163 being wontfixed, this bug is as FIXED as it's ever going to be.