Friends Don't Let Friends Use IE 19 years, 10 months ago by Martey Dodoo

Wesner Moise, a former Microsoft employee, writes about how his computer contracted a Trojan Horse, as a result of using Internet Explorer. Frankly, I was not surprised until I read the last paragraph:

I can't believe that it was this easy to become infected; I also couldn't believe that Internet Explorer could be so flawed as to allow an a security breach like this. This discovery led to my decision to install Windows XP Service Pack 2, despite my disinclination to run beta software on my main development machine. The installation was flawless, by the way.

Yes, his security problem has been fixed...for now. But what will happen when a new hole is found? Sure, it is possible that a quick fix will be released by Microsoft through Windows Update, but it is also possible that it will become another entry in the list of unpatched Internet Explorer vulnerabilities. Since Thor Larholm's list is no longer active, it has become extremely difficult for most users to keep track of them; unpatched holes do not appear in Windows Update.

It would be simple to accept Mr. Moise's solution; running the version of Internet Explorer in Windows XP SP2 will protect his computer more than the standard Internet Explorer in XP SP1. But it is not a longterm solution; there will be more Internet Explorer holes. Even more disconcertingly, users running versions of Windows prior to XP (98, ME, 2000) cannot simply install a new service pack to get the improvements currently enjoyed by users of the various release candidates of Service Pack 2.

Enter my simple solution. Unlike Internet Explorer, updated versions of Firefox come out regularly (there are even nightly builds available), and will run on all recent versions of Windows. Add a rapidly growing list of features (including integrated popup blocking, tabbed browsing, importation of IE profile information, skinning the browser using themes, and the ability to add new features through extensions) and there is no reason to use Internet Explorer as your primary browser.