In Mountain Lion, I keep seeing a dialogue box flash on my screen very quickly--almost too fast to notice. I'm worried that it is spyware taking screen shots--help!

did you get anywhere with this? I bought a brother mfc -8810dw and after installing the software im getting a firewall alert about java. It flashes quick and doesnt give you enough time to read it but. the only way i have found to stop it is to shut off firewall or disabale java. if you disable java then when you go to sites that need it they will not display properly

Afraid not. I was waitiing to see if there was a definitve answer on it.

I have this problem too - it started after the last OS X update which included a Java security fix.

In Console, the firewall log keeps reiterating

"imac.local socketfilterfw[102] <Info>: java is listening from :::0 proto 6"

iMac:~ rick$ ps -ef | grep ja[v]a

0 107 1 0 11:01pm ?? 0:01.60 /usr/sbin/xtendsan/iscsid -d -J-Djava.security.policy=/usr/sbin/xtendsan/iscsid.sec -J-Dcom.attotech.iscsid.discovery.verbose=true --J-Dcom.attotech.iscsid.logLevel=VERBOSE --J-Dcom.attotech.iscsid.discovery.MaxRecvDataSegmentLength=512 --J-Dcom.attotech.iscsid.discovery.AllowPaddedDSL=true

iMac:~ rick$ ps -ef | grep 1[0]2

0 102 1 0 11:01pm ?? 0:15.88 /usr/libexec/ApplicationFirewall/socketfilterfw

What I can't work out is which application is trying to run java in the first place. It's almost as if the Firewall is trying to auto-accept the java process, and then failing.

I've seen a supposed workaround where you manually sign the java binary (more command line wizardry), but this didn't work for me. The only java I have installed is the latest JDK 1.6 from the Apple Developer site (I definitely don't have Oracle JRE 7 installed).

So far, the only workarounds I have (in decreasing order of acceptability) are:

1. Completely remove Java from your computer

2. Disable your firewall.

Any ideas?

I have started to have the same problem, and without any change to the system. All was running fine after updating to 10.8.3. On starting up system today, the mysterious, rapid on-off d. box began to appear. Managed to get this screen grab:

Not happy with turning FW wall but it seems to be the only workaround. Anyone listening at Apple???

There is one other workaround that seems to stop the blinking Dbox: SystemPreferances > Security & Privacy > Firewall > Firewall Options > Block All Incoming Connections. Again, not an ideal workaround but it halts the anoying screen. Before doing this, I switched on evey firewall option individually, hoping to find a single software permission. No success. Given that this problem has appeared without any new update or install, and occurs even when none but Apple's default firewall items are on ( DVD or CD sharing, AFP and SSH) I suspect this is something only Apple can resolve.

Message was edited by: sonofido

Disable Java, and turning the FW off will not cause any harm, there is a Firewall in your router, you don't need 2.

Does the image look anything like these ones? If so then it's the system blocking a Java applet from running and attempting to warn you about the applet.

Not happy with turning FW wall but it seems to be the only workaround.

Your Firewall almost certainly should be turned off. See:

Do I need a firewall?

Also, you need to be aware that using Java in your web browser is exceedingly dangerous. During the last year, there has almost never been a time when Java didn't leave users vulnerable to attack. See:

Java is vulnerable… Again?!

http://java-0day.com

That said, it's okay to use Java-based applications on your computer, just not in your web browser. I'm unsure of whether that alert is being displayed because of a Java applet in a web page you have loaded or because of a Java-based app running in the background.

At one time I was getting spurious dialogue boxes from a social networking site sending notifications of upcoming events (Meetup.com). There was something wrong the other end because most were empty anyway. I unchecked the option to receive them.

I had what sounds like the same problem (dialog box that flashes up every 30 seconds or so but goes away so fast that you can't read what it says), and it appears it was related to my Dockboss Air bluetooth adapter for my iPod speakers. I use the adapter to stream audio to those speakers via bluetooth (either from my computer or from my iPhone). And I had removed the device from my computer's bluetooth configuration (Mountain Lion). The DockBoss was apparently asking my computer to pair. And for some reason the dialog box would pop up and then go away so quickly you couldn't read it. Finally, at one point the pairing dialog box came up and stayed up, and asked me if I wanted to pair with the DockBoss. I would say no, and the process would repeat. Most of the time the dialog box popped up and went away so quickly I couldn't see anything but a flash.

So, I just unplugged my speakers, taking power away from the DockBoss, and everything is fine now.

Not sure how to resolve this permanently, as when I left the DockBoss paired with my Mac, it would wake it up peridically from sleep.

I submitted this as a question to CableJive, the makers of DockBoss Air.

If the message is frequent, you could make a screen recording of it and play this back to read it. Go to the Utilities folder, Quicktime>File Menu and choose the option from there. Note the file gets quite big, so don't run it too long.