Microsoft admits Explorer used in Google China hack

Not sure if it is obvious from this short article or not but cybercrooks often string one or more exploits of vulnerabilities in one or more programs in order to compromise a computer. So it is not necessarily certain at all that IE was the only flawed program involve.d Crooks will go after operating system flaws, web browser plugin flaws, application flaws, driver flaws - anything they can that helps them, basically.

A lot of companies went to "thin computing" with the assumption that would decrease their computing risks. It would seem they should consider much more carefully whether the browser they use poses more risks than anything else.

That is what the "weak link in the chain" comment means at the beginning of the BBC article.

There are other web browsers. I do not see why people persist in using Internet Explorer. It has fallen far behind the other web browsers in Internet Standards, is greatly favored by cybercrooks, and has an appalling design and track record.

IE6 was exploited. IE7 introduced changes to make the type of exploit more difficult, but unfortunately, on Windows XP the features IE7 and IE8 rely on to do that extra protection do not exist. So running IE6 on Windows XP right now is a horrible choice.

The simplest way to slash that risk is to install a third-part web browser, and change it to be your default web browser. Then, upgrade IE when you can.

http://www.mozilla.com/
http://www.apple.com/safari
http://www.google.com/chrome

Firefox 3.5 (current) is more popular than any version of Internet Explorer right now. Internet Explorer 6, which makes web mail, Google docs, and other web 2.0 applications run much faster is expected to be out any day now. Firefox has the best bookmarks manager of any web browser, by far.

Safari has small market share but has slightly better support for web standards. However, it has far fewer extensions than Firefox, IE, and Chrome. On the other hand, Safari runs fast. Some power users load up Firefox with lots of extensions (e.g. addons, toolbars, etc.) which slows it down slightly, and then use Safari or Chrome when they want to do something fast that does not require the use of any extensions.

Chrome, like Safari, is extra fast. Chrome uses the same engine as Safari (webkit) which is an open source component from Apple. That component in turn, is based on the KDE Konqueror web browser from Linux.

Internet Explorer is in a transition phase now where it is far from the safest, fastest, or most up to date web browser. The thing it is most in is the news, for incidents like this.

Pulling away from it would take the pressure off Microsoft to do as much day-to-day firefighting as like it says it has to do, and focus on IE as an R&D effort instead of an unending headache. They need time to reboot IE - start over, basically. The more people use IE, the less Microsoft can fix IE. In now way does using IE contribute to getting its problems solved faster, just more disasters like this one.