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Versions 1.5.0.7 of the Firefox browser and the Thunderbird mail client have been appearing on user PCs as Mozilla tweaks a few security issues with both products.

Before everyone gets too excited about Firefox 2.0 coming out later in October, the Mozilla Foundation has some updates for the currently shipping versions of Firefox and Thunderbird.

Automatic updates began appearing yesterday for users of the products. The new version provides updates to the stability of the products, and some needed security fixes.

Four of the seven security fixes in Firefox and Thunderbird were rated as Critical problems. Researchers at Mozilla were concerned over product crashes.

"Some of these were crashes that showed evidence of memory corruption and we presume that at least some of these could be exploited to run arbitrary code with enough effort," Mozilla noted in an advisory note.

They further cautioned users of the Thunderbird suite to keep JavaScript disabled for mail. That is the default setting and Mozilla strongly discourages Thunderbird users from changing it, as the software uses the same engine as Firefox.

At the Spread Firefox blog, it has been noted that Firefox has anywhere from 10 to 15 percent of the browser market, reflecting its adoption by millions of users.

But in Eastern Europe, those numbers skew upward dramatically. Most of Europe passes 10 percent easily, while in some countries the range exceeds 30 percent. Globally, NetApplications estimated August 2006 browser share at 11.84 percent for Firefox, compared to Internet Explorer's 83 percent.

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David Utter is a staff writer for WebProNews covering technology and business.