I have a follow-up on this, as I believe I may have found the actual source of the problem: mod_security
Logged into my server in SSH: cat /usr/local/apache/logs/error_log |grep cookie.js
gives me a LOT of the following error:
[Sun Oct 09 11:06:29 2011] [error] [client 59.69.79.189] ModSecurity: Access denied with code 406 (phase 2). Pattern match "(?:\\\\b(?:(?:type\\\\b\\\\W*?\\\\b(?:text\\\\b\\\\W*?\\\\b(?:j(?:ava)?|ecma|vb)|application\\\\b\\\\W*?\\\\bx-(?:java|vb))script|c(?:opyparentfolder|reatetextrange)|get(?:special|parent)folder|iframe\\\\b.{0,100}?\\\\bsrc)\\\\b|on(?:(?:mo(?:use(?:o(?:ver|ut)|down|move|up)|ve)| ..." at REQUEST_FILENAME. [file "/usr/local/apache/conf/modsec2.user.conf"] [line "117"] [id "950004"] [msg "Cross-site Scripting (XSS) Attack"] [data ".cookie"] [severity "CRITICAL"] [tag "WEB_ATTACK/XSS"] [hostname "www.my-website.com"] [uri "/administrator/components/com_virtuemart/assets/js/jquery.cookie.js"] [unique_id "TpG4dbitTqYACpDqW0cAAAAB"]
So, if you're running your own servers (as I am), you can either rename the files (good temporary solution) or disable your security (not gonna happen). Maybe as a long-term solution, VM can incorporate a code change to make their cookie.js file not look like an XSS attack to mod_security!