Bing Hijacking of Firefox

My browser was hijacked by Bing when I downloaded a recent update. After the hijacking I could no longer enter a plain-text website name (Like "Amazon" or "Home Depot") into the navigation window, hit enter, and get taken to the website in question. INSTEAD, I was directed to a Bing search page.
Here's the fix:
1. Type "about:config" in Firefox’s address bar (without the quotes), hit ENTER, and if you get a cute little warning box pop up telling you that you're going to void your warranty, tell it to trust you.
2. You get a page full of intimidating looking computer stuff. Near the top, in the Filter box, type "keyword". That will bring you to the keyword section.
3. You should find at least a couple of keyword entries. Make sure that "keyword.enabled" is set to "true".
4. Look for "keyword.url" and double-click on it. When the box pops up to let you edit it, clear out the contents and paste the following string into the box.
http://www.google.com/search?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=
5. Click OK.
6. Clear "keyword" from the filter window, and type in "B I N G", one letter at a time. Slowly. Wherever you see "Bing", change it to "Google". ([i]or whatever[/i])
When you're all done, restart Firefox, test your browser function by typing "Amazon" into the address window and seeing if it works.
Then face West and say: BITE ME, BILL!!
== This happened ==
Every time Firefox opened
== I downloaded a recent Microsoft update

This is fine but how did it happen? Why is Ff hijacked by Bing and what can I do to '''''prevent''''' it?

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