Friday, July 02, 2004
STOP Using Internet Explorer!
The Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Computer Emergency Readiness Team touched off a storm this week when it recommended for security reasons using browsers other than Microsoft Corp.'s Internet Explorer. The Microsoft browser, the government warned, cannot protect against vulnerabilities in its Internet Information Services (IIS) 5 server programs, which a team of hackers allegedly based in Russia has exploited with a Java script that is appended to Web sites. -- Loring Wirbel, EE Times, "U.S. Steers Consumers Away From IE"
Can I say WOW! I never expected to fully agree with anything coming out of the Department of Homeland Security. Let’s face it, DHS ultimately believes that your freedom is less important than your security. Tons of people would agree, I’m just not one of them. I believe the more freedoms you give up to be secure, the less secure you should feel.
So imagine my surprise, when the Department, that has purchased quite a few Windows-based PCs, actually issued a warning about Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. Of course its a bit late in the game. I issued an official warning to our clients last, Thursday of last week. CERT issued a national warning by Friday afternoon, and so a week later the Department of Homeland Security steps forward. Wow, that’s rapid response for you. Okay, scorn and scoffing aside. They’ve done a good thing. So brownie points to them.
And as for you. Download a different browser, especially if you use Microsoft Windows as an operating system. You have a number of choices, there’s Netscape 7.1, multiple flavors of Mozilla, including the ever popular FireFox, Mozilla 1.7, and Camino for Mac OS X users. If you don’t mind paying for your pleasure there is also Opera and other browsers.
Personally, I use Safari on Mac OS X, and Netscape 7.1 on Windows. FireFox is blazing, and has some great work going on, but Netscape is just more familiar, and has some great features as well.
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