GarageBand update includes security fix

Stephen Withers
Tuesday, 04 August 2009 08:20

Business IT - Technology

If you relied on Apple's release notes, you wouldn't know that GarageBand 5.1 fixes a security issue. According to Apple, GarageBand 5.1 "addresses general compatibility issues, improves overall stability, and fixes a number of other minor issues."

Specific changes mentioned include adding track effects and Audio Units to guitar tracks, improved support for Apogee audio interfaces, faster switching to full screen in Magic GarageBand, and improved access to audio monitoring settings.

But a separate document discloses a security fix that's also included in the update.

It seems that opening GarageBand could change Safari's security preferences to allow cookies to be accepted from all sites rather than "Only from sites I visit" (which blocks third-party cookies such as those from advertisers).

The update is said to correct this behaviour, although iTWire's testing with GarageBand 5.0.2 and Safari 4.0.2 could not duplicate the problem.

Apple recommends the update to all users of GarageBand 09, and advises those who have used previous versions of GarageBand to check that Safari's settings do reflect their preference with regard to accepting cookies.

While this is not a major problem compared with a vulnerability that can be exploited, it does interfere with reasonable expectations of privacy after a browser has been set to block third-party cookies.