In the lower-right corner click the button marked Disable. Restart IE. At the bottom of the screen, you’ll see a notice that says, “The ‘Java(tm) Plug-In SSV Helper’ add-on from ‘Oracle ...

The steps are simple: click on the Firefox button (Tools menu in Windows XP), click Add-ons, click on the Plugins panel, click on the Java (TM) Platform plugin, and click on the Disable button.