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I have an old Windows desktop offline application (Tap'Touche) that uses Flash for some of its features.

Yesterday (11 Jan 2021) it worked just fine, as it did during several years.

Today (12 Jan 2021), it simply stopped working: the Flash-based animations are replaced with a Flash logo, and while most of the application works fine (it's a typing app, so I can type the letters and such), when a level is completed, it waits for the animation to play and, since it no longer works, the level is not completed and my scores are not recorded.

I'm appalled at the fact that Microsoft disabled offline, desktop applications for no reason, without a prior warning on Windows itself.

I manually changed the date on Windows to yesterday, and it works again.

How can I keep it working without having to reset the clock on my computer? Is there a way to emulate the date or use something so that Windows will not arbitrarily decide to block?

Edit: this application is not launched by Flash, but it uses Flash for some of its features. So I cannot simply launch it using Newgrounds Flash Player; unless there is a way to replace the default player that is used by the application, I believe Newgrounds's one is not useful here.

Edit: I could find a standalone Flash player on the Internet Archive, but it does not work: it is simply a binary similar to Newgrounds' player. The old player seems to be located at C:\Windows\System32\Macromed\Flash or C:\Windows\SysWow64\Macromed\Flash. I found a Flash uninstaller executable on the Internet Archive and used it, then reinstalled a Flash player version 32.0.0.363, the latest before the "time bomb" by Adobe, but it does not change the version used by Tap'Touche. Apparently it uses the "ActiveX"-based executable which I found in my SysWow64 directory, but even if I rename it (so that the file is not found), the .363 installer still claims that "a more recent version is already installed". It seems Microsoft has a specific Windows update that removes Flash completely, but I couldn't find it. I tried deleting some registry keys related to Flash, so that the installer would work, but even as administrator I couldn't remove them.

anol
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2 Answers2

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It's not Microsoft that have blocked Flash, it's Adobe.

From Adobe Flash Player EOL General Information Page

Since Adobe is no longer supporting Flash Player after the EOL Date, Adobe will block Flash content from running in Flash Player beginning January 12, 2021 to help secure users’ systems. Flash Player may remain on the user’s system unless the user uninstalls it.

As to why it also fails on local content as well as remote web content…

From The Register - That's it. It's over. It's really over. From today, Adobe Flash Player no longer works. We're free. We can just leave

More specifically, what's happened is that Adobe snuck a logic bomb into its Flash software some releases ago that activates on January 12, and causes the code to refuse to render any more content from that date. Adobe has also removed previous versions from its site, and "strongly recommends all users immediately uninstall Flash Player to help protect their systems."

A workaround would be to set your computer's clock back to the 11th.

There is an alternative Flash Player, by NewGrounds, that is supposed to enable old Flash content - https://www.newgrounds.com/flash/player I have't tried it, don't know how well it works, what browsers it can be installed on, or what its security implications might be.

Tetsujin
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  • Microsoft will be making a patch that removes all Flash components and Flash support from Windows "Recommended" which means it will install for most average users, later this year: https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2020/09/04/update-adobe-flash-end-support/ – music2myear Jan 13 '21 at 02:47
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https://github.com/jindrapetrik/jpexs-decompiler still works. It has an internal flash player.

user1261360
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