You are here: Home » News » Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable.

Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable.

Written on 16th December 2008 14 COMMENTS
Zee, Editor in Chief at The Next Web, Principal at WeDoCreative.

Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable. If you’re still looking for a reason to finally switch loyalty from Internet Explorer over to one of many competing browsers, trust me, this is it.

A major flaw in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer that allows hackers to gain the password details of the user has been revealed.

This is not a rumor, it has been confirmed by Microsoft who in fact announced the discovery themselves admitting a “vulnerability in Internet Explorer” that “could allow remote code execution.” Not Good.

Still think this is over hyped news? Think again. Even the BBC has picked up the story with commentary from a number of industry analysts.

Microsoft are preparing an emergency patch to resolve the flaw but in the meantime a move to Firefox, Opera and Safari is highly recommended.

MICROSOFT SECURITY ADVICE

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

Unsurprisingly, “switching browsers” isn’t on that list.

“I cannot recommend people switch due to this one flaw,” said John Curran, head of Microsoft UK’s Windows group. “At present, this exploit only seems to affect 0.02% of internet sites. In terms of vulnerability, it only seems to be affecting IE7 users at the moment, but could well encompass other versions in time.”

To summarise, SWITCH.

Photo Credit

14 Comments »

About the author: Based in London, Zee is Editor in Chief at The Next Web and Principal at online marketing and new media agency WeDoCreative . A prominent tech blogger, he is also a design & marketing connoisseur, social media devotee & web application fanatic.

14 comments/trackbacks to “Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable.”

Dec 16, 2008: Warning: Serious IE Security Flaw, Switch Browsers Now | Monty's Mega Marketing
[...] Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable. [...]
Dec 17, 2008: fabioespindula (Fabio Espindula)
Vulnerability in Internet Explorer Could Allow Remote Code Execution ~ http://tinyurl.com/5m7xja

Reply
Dec 17, 2008: A new browser for Christmas? | Cheeze Blog
[...] Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable. [...]
Dec 17, 2008: mptado (Matt Furtado)
Please tell me that this means the end of IE – http://tinyurl.com/5m7xja

Reply
Dec 18, 2008: Internet Explorer? Tuibguy says "No, Thanks!" | Tangled Up in Blue Guy
[...] Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable. [...]
Dec 24, 2008: waltdesign.com » Blog Archive » Browser Know How – IE7
[...] Dump Internet Explorer. You are Vulnerable. [...]
Feb 11, 2009: Ryan Brotherton » Internet Explorer 6
[...] (http://thenextweb.com/2008/12/.....t-for-now/) [...]

By Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten on Dec 16, 2008

You could switch to Explorer 8 if you don’t like Firefox:
http://www.tgdaily.com/html_tm.....8-140.html

Reply
By Freek Smoes on Dec 16, 2008

I’m not a big IE fan, but other browsers have vulnerobilities too: http://www.info-svc.com/news/2008/12-12/

Reply
By Reinier Battenberg on December 17th, 2008:
But not one that will allow people to install any software on your machine that they want without you noticing.

It is a matter of risk assessment, and using the current version of IE is high risk. Switching to Firefox eliminates that risk to almost 0, and fixes a few issues in the password manager at the same time.

Do you follow the same logic if you choose an airline as well?

Reply
By Freek Smoes on December 17th, 2008:
Reinier, I agree with your point and I’m a happy Firefox user, just wanted to point out that all browsers have vulnerabilities so switching doesn’t mean your 100% safe

To use your airline analogy: Even Quantas has crashed..: http://www.rb-29.net/HTML/03Re.....rashes.htm

Reply
By deepikaur on Dec 16, 2008

Boris, it’s been stated that all IE browsers have this flaw, but they are working on it. :)

This would be a great opportunity for solid IE users to try out one of the other browsers (at least Firefox, if not Chrome) and make a permanent switch if they end up liking it.

“To summarise, SWITCH.”

Reply
By Russ on Dec 17, 2008

Fun how just after the IE announcement the Mozilla organization released this: http://secunia.com/Advisories/33203/
Basically it’s a remote code exploit in Firefox 2&3.
You’ld almost think they were waiting for all the ‘IE sucks, switch to Firefox’ press before releasing their own.

Reply
By Reinier on December 17th, 2008:
with the slight difference, that there is no exploit in the wild, and that they provide a fix, together with the announcement.

Any plane can crash, the M$ tickets are just more expensive and crash harder.

Reply