Archive for Internet Explorer

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Microsoft Says IE8 Is “World’s Fastest Browser”….. WTF?

Posted in Commentary with tags , on March 13, 2009 by itnerd

From the “What drugs are these twits smoking” department comes this report from Microsoft that declares Internet Explorer 8 the “World’s Fastest Browser.” I’m not sure how they came up with that although slanting the tests in your favor comes to mind as the likely reason as pretty much every other benchmark I’ve ever seen (let’s take this one for example) says quite the opposite.

I guess that Microsoft is tired of being on the losing end of the brower wars. Still this isn’t they way to give yourself some street cred.

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IE Loses More Marketshare To Safari, Chrome, And FireFox…. Chairs Will Be Thrown Over This At Microsoft HQ

Posted in Commentary with tags , , on February 2, 2009 by itnerd

Microsoft via their Internet Explorer browser continues to lose marketshare in the browser market to Safari, Chrome, And FireFox. The latest figures from Net Applications gives IE a 67.55% share of the market at the moment, which is a 1% slide since last month. Firefox is up to 21.53% while Safari is up to 8.29% and Chrome is up to 1.12%. All of which are gains over the previous month.

Since March 2008, IE has lost over 7%. I’m guessing that Microsoft is betting that IE 8 which has a release candidate out in the wild will help to stop the bleeding. But perhaps the game is already over. We’ll see when IE 8 actually ships.

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Microsoft Issues Emergency Patch For IE Flaw [UPDATED]

Posted in Security with tags , on December 17, 2008 by itnerd

That was fast!

Microsoft is releasing a patch sometime today to fix the Internet Explorer flaw that I discussed yesterday. It’s unusual for Microsoft to release patches outside of it’s normal release schedule of the second Tuesday of the month. But given how serious this flaw is, they really didn’t have a choice. Frequent readers of this blog will note that this is the second time this year that Microsoft has had to come out with an emergency patch.

When I have a download link to the patch, I’ll post it here (or you can always pull it via Windows Update).

UPDATE: The security bulletin with the updates can be found here. Or you can use Windows Update to install the proper patch.

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Microsoft Warns Users Of IE Related Security Flaw…. Glad I Use Firefox [UPDATED]

Posted in Security with tags , , on December 16, 2008 by itnerd

Here’s a shock. Microsoft’s Internet Explorer has a security hole that is serious enough that Microsoft has put out a security advisory on the subject:

“Microsoft is continuing its investigation of public reports of attacks against a new vulnerability in Internet Explorer. Our investigation so far has shown that these attacks are only against Windows Internet Explorer 7 on supported editions of Windows XP Service Pack 2, Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 1, Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2, Windows Vista, Windows Vista Service Pack 1, and Windows Server 2008. Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.01 Service Pack 4, Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1, Microsoft Internet Explorer 6, and Windows Internet Explorer 8 Beta 2 on all supported versions of Microsoft Windows are potentially vulnerable.”

Well that’s not good.

The flaw lets criminals take over computers merely by tricking them into visiting web sites with malicious code installed on them. As many as 10,000 sites might have been taken over according to this AP report.

For the time being, the advice that I would have for you would be to switch to Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Opera until the dust settles. But if that’s not possible, here’s Microsoft’s advice for those who are sticking with IE:

  • Change IE security settings to high (Look under Tools/Internet Options)
  • Switch to a Windows user account with limited rights to change a PC’s settings
  • With IE7 or 8 on Vista turn on Protected Mode
  • Ensure your PC is updated
  • Keep anti-virus and anti-spyware software up to date

The hole will be fixed likely with an emergency out of cycle patch. Given the scope of this issue, Microsoft really has no other choice but to get this out the door ASAP.

Meanwhile, the Mac Fanbois and LINUX geeks are likely dancing in the streets over this latest Microsoft screw up.

UPDATE: As if on cue, Firefox 3.0.5 has hit the streets. You can view the changelog here, or just download it from here.

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IE8 Beta 2: Not What I Expected

Posted in Commentary with tags on September 1, 2008 by itnerd

So, the second beta of Internet Explorer 8 has hit the streets. Already the word is that it’s not living up to expectations.

Let’s start with the “Stealth Browsing” mode that I spoke of earlier. It apparently doesn’t work. It seems that it leaks private data, which is not the way it should work. But this gets worse. IE8 was supposed to be standards compliant. What that means is that IE will support all the web standards that exist as opposed to the Microsoft ones. Too bad that it actually doesn’t do that. Then to top it off, once you install this beta, you can’t uninstall it if you have XP SP3 and the first IE8 beta installed. Now the IE 8 Beta 2 installer does warn you of this, but it is a big dis-incentive to try out this browser.

I think I’ll sit out trying out IE8 and stick to Firefox. Someone wake me up when it is closer to being finished.

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IE8 Will have “Stealth Browsing”… Cool!

Posted in Commentary with tags , on August 26, 2008 by itnerd

Microsoft announced via the IE8 blog that Internet Explorer 8 will have a bunch of new features to protect your privacy when you surf the Internet. Something that I call “stealth browsing.” Here’s a quick rundown on what these features are:

  • InPrivate Browsing will let users control whether IE 8 saves their browsing history, cookies, and other Internet data.
  • InPrivate Blocking will inform users about sites that can track their browsing history, and will allow them to block such activity.
  • InPrivate Subscriptions will let users choose which Web sites to subscribe to or block.
  • Delete Browsing History, gives users control over their browsing history after visiting a Web site.

All of these features will give users more choice over what information is collected by websites when users surf for porn. It will also help users to cover their tracks when surfing on the Internet for porn.

I applaud Microsoft for doing this. The question is will they be effective in protecting your privacy while you’re surfing for porn? I suppose that once the second IE8 beta ships, we’ll have a better idea.

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Study Says Firefox Users Safest On The Web, But IE Has The Most Users

Posted in Commentary with tags , , , on July 7, 2008 by itnerd

A new study is out from The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Google, and IBM that has some interesting things to say about web browsers and security. For example:

  • Firefox users were found to be the most likely to use the latest version of that browser. Apple Safari users were second. Microsoft Internet Exploiter Explorer was dead last. This is important because the study noted that failing to keep browser software updated greatly increases web surfers’ online security vulnerability to attacks. So this result means that Firefox users are more likely to be secure than any other browser.
  • The study also reported that Internet Explorer had 1.1 billion users or 78.3 per cent, Firefox had 227 million users or 16.1 per cent, Safari 48 million users or 3.4 per cent, and Opera just 11 million users or 0.8 per cent. This means that if I were a “evil doer” who wanted to target web surfers, I’d target Internet Explorer (after all, most other “evil doers” already do) as there’s more of those users out there which means that I am more likely to to get a browser that is not up to date.

Here’s a link to the full study. It’s a very interesting read. In the meantime, make sure your browser is up to date so that you’re protected from “evil doers.”

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