In the news today is a very high profile security flaw in Microsoft browser, Internet Explorer. Hackers have been hijacking websites and inserting code that enables them to steal username and password information of persons browsing using IE.

Microsoft made the situation public at the end of last week by which time they had calculated that 0.2% of internet users would have been exposed to a website that had been the subject of this hacking. 

Apparently other browers are not affected at this time so users of Safari, Firefox, Opera et al should be safe at this time. This isn’t to say that web users should never use IE. Microsoft is working on a fix and most software of this type is likely to be subject to different vulnerabilities at different times.

A browser is a very personal thing. Different people like different browsers. Because it what I have always used IE that is typically what I stick with. However the Microsoft browser is known amongst tecchies as being imperfect and serious geeks won’t touch it with a bargepole. That isn’t to say it is no good. You just have to understand how the minds of most engineers work.

There are in fact times when I have to resort to other browsers to make a certain web functions work. For example when I am writing posts for this blog if I need to upload photos then as often as not I can’t do it using IE and have to resort to an alternative.