Microsoft has just launched its fall IE advertising campaign and maintains the strategy of touting IE’s superior security features. A website that has been created in partnership with the Online Trust Alliance, the Identity Theft Council, and the Anti-Phishing Working Group, Microsoft concludes that IE achieves a perfect score in browser security and both Chrome and Firefox will leave you unprotected against certain attacks.
“Stay safe” is the tone of the Your browser matters website, which instantly ranks your browser on security features. The bottom line is that it is simply a browser version check, which will give a current IE9 or IE10 a score of 4/4, a current Chrome 2.5/4, the current Firefox version 7 a result of 2/4 and the older Firefox 3.6 just 1.5/4. In 16 evaluated criteria, IE misses only 3 security features, Chrome misses 7 and Firefox fails on 9.
While you drop into a panic if you are using Chrome or Firefox, you could realize that the value of the evaluation is somewhat limited. Can a browser’s security be based on 16 hand-picked features? Probably not and each browser maker could slant the evaluation in any direction that puts them into a better light. Is Firefox 7 only half as secure as IE9? That would depend on your view and on a test scenario, but I would think that Mozilla would disagree. A fair scenario may also consider the frequency of update cycles and their effectiveness, for example.
We are not aware of any browser security evaluation that is comprehensive enough to provide a clear-cut recommendation, which is the most secure browser. Too many security features have circumstantial value; the best protection against malware today remains common sense on the user side and a healthy dose of interest to stay up to date on what not to do on the Internet and how to discover and get rid of malware should you be infected. The fact is that no browser is 100% safe at this time. If you contract malware on IE, because the browser does not auto-update a browser-extension, it is not much help that IE is generally considered a safer browser, but you learn that only its rivals support browser extension auto-updates.
The latest Microsoft campaign has, just like most other browser campaigns (including the recent pitches by Google) questionable marketing value. When Microsoft launched its IE8 security (TV and Internet) campaign in July of last year, it showed immediate effect as the decline of IE market share was halted for two months. However, a year later, IE had lost about 10 points of market share and is battling to stay above the next big barrier this month: 40%. 12 days into October, IE market share is down more than 1 point over September and has averaged 40.07% this month, according to StatCounter. Firefox stabilized at 26.8%, while Chrome appears to have picked up share from IE and will be playing with the 25% mark this month. Chrome currently stands at 24.62% in October, but is sharply trending up.
Depending on its exposure, Microsoft’s latest marketing campaign is most certainly impacting the browser share race. IE share is about half a point higher today than it was yesterday (41.22% versus 40.62%), but the value will change slightly until the day is over as regions with higher Chrome market share (including South America) are fully included in StatCounter’s charts.
In our opinion, education about browser security is necessary and we are glad that Microsoft highlights the importance and basic vulnerabilities on its new site. However, giving a false sense of security by telling users that their browser achieves a perfect score of 4/4, while it clearly has vulnerabilities and imperfections, is counterproductive and potentially misleading. It is critical for users to not lose their Internet smarts and realize that irresponsible behavior will not protect them from malware, no matter what browser they use.
Wolfgang Gruener in Business on October 12
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