Faux Microsoft-Firefox site pulled

A Web site spoofing a marriage between Microsoft and Mozilla's Firefox browsers has vanished as mysteriously as it popped up online.

Early Monday, the site advertised MS Firefox 2007, a Web browser that "delivers a dramatic boost in the download speeds of online pornography." In other words, it read, "Fun at the speed of light!" It also warned that use of MS Firefox 2007 would crash such sites as Google, Apple's iTunes and any others containing the phrase, "microsoft/windows/explorer/vista/bill sucks."

But by afternoon, the site delivered a "forbidden" error and was inaccessible. (A cached version is still available from Google from the keywords "Microsoft Firefox.")

Calls to Microsoft and Mozilla Foundation representatives were not immediately returned, so it's unclear whether either camp knew about the faux site or requested its removal. The domain "msfirefox.com" was registered privately, according to the WhoIs database, and it's no wonder. The fake site tried to collect donations, because, as it read, Microsoft is a "nonprofit foundation exempt from Federal income taxation." Now that's funnier than an IE-Firefox coupling.