I came accross this news post last night from BBC News, and at first I thought OK so Microsoft aren’t going to ship internet explorer with their new version of Windows for all computers in Europe. The reason behind this is all to do with a big anti-competition lawsuit that Microsoft are battling with the European Commision. In a nutshell Europe believe that Microsoft are behaving in an anti-competitive manner by incorporating Media Player and Internet Explorer in such a way that makes it hard for users to switch web browsers. Now I don’t disagree with that at all, Microsoft tie them into the operating system and make it very difficult to break these ties.
Now my initial reaction to Microsoft’s course of action to stop incorporating internet explorer as part of the operating system install was, ok thats fair enough. Then it hit me, if you install windows or buy a computer with no web browser installed how on earth are you going to browse the web to download any other browser software?!? I’m sorry but this is like saying to me ‘Oh here have a television but you can’t have an aerial or dvd player’
Microsoft what on earth are you thinking??? It is beginning to become apparent to me that this behemoth software company just takes one step forward (Windows 7) and four steps back!!! Now we all understand that you don’t want to continue spending millions on lawsuits but there are other ways to avoid this rather than once again making life hell for the end user of your products.
What would have been wrong with simply leaving the web browser on their but not making it so entrenched in the system, or after install show a software update style page that allows you to choose from the most commonly used web browsers, the consumer can then make their choice and go on. It makes no sense to me for Microsoft to leave it out all together or provide it as additional software in the form of a CD. Compact Disks are slowly but surely becoming something that we will not need, I don’t know the last time I used a CD to install software simply because I download it all off the internet. Computer manufactures that are ahead of the game are aware of this, take Apple for example. When designing and releasing their MacBook Air they left out the optical drive altogether as they are aware that when you have a secondary computer you don’t need the drive.
I’m not saying that CD’s are obsolete or don’t serve their purpose, but why bother wasting more of the worlds resources stamping thousands or millions of CD’s with something that could simply be included with the operating system?
Besides anybody who is a user of the web is aware that Internet Explorer is an out of date, obsolete and slow web browser. Microsoft have failed to keep up with emerging web standards with their latest release of this browsers software, my solution for them is simple if your going to do a half baked job at something (i.e IE8) then don’t even bother trying, leave it up to the people who do know what web browsing is all about Mozilla with their Firefox, Apple’s Safari and Google Chrome. These companies know the web and are designing browsers for the future. Once again Microsoft you are behind the eight ball before you even start.
Keep in mind that as to my knowledge this will not affect anybody outside of Europe, but the way Microsoft seems to be handling this just goes to show they feel they have a monopoly and can do what they feel like with no regard for the end user. If you want to keep up with the best of them Microsoft you will have to do better than this.
Posted by Luke | Posted on 06-06-2009
Category : Internet/Tech, Security
Tags: internet, Java, Macintosh, Security
It is not very often that you hear about security vulnerabilities that affect the Macintosh operating system, in fact the ’security’ of running OS X is proudly flaunted by Apple, and for the most part it makes working in the OS X environment a pretty worry free experience. However as Apple’s market share increases and the Mac becomes a more prominent operating system it is only reasonable to assume that it may become more of a target for those bad guys out in cyber world who are writing all these nasty viruses and malicious software.
It was while listening to one of my favourite podcasts – MacBreak Weekly (can be found at twit.tv), that I came to hear about this vulnerability which all revolves around Java. Now for us lowly computer users Java is not something that we actively use, its an architecture or software which lives on your computer and allows you to access all that cool content on the internet. If you have ever played online games, used web based chat then you have inadvertently used Java.
The issue of concern for people running a Mac is that there is a flaw within Java, this flaw basically allows a remote person or malicious tool to gain access to your computers code (all the bits and bytes that run behind the glossy dock and shiny windows that we use everyday). And the more worrying thing is that if you were to come across a site that did take advantage of this vulnerability, it would get into your computer all without your knowledge.
So at this time the recommended fix for this to protect yourself from any potential exploits is to turn off Java in your internet browsers settings/preferences area. The other good thing at this point in time is that there are no known web sites or Java ‘applets’ that actually take advantage of this flaw, however having said this once the bad guys are aware there is a problem it wouldn’t take someone long to put a script together.
What bugs me more about this is that Apple have known about this flaw in Java for 5 months now, yet just a few days ago a Software Update was released and guess what…flaw not fixed…I would’ve thought that with five months up their sleeves that would’ve been plenty of time to get a fix underway.
Moral of this story, don’t be complacent on the internet Mac users. We all get a little lax when it comes to security as we usually take for granted that there are no real risks out there in the wild that is the internet. Hopefully now that this flaw has been made public by the security company Intego Security (the ones that came across it) it will prompt Apple to push out an update so we can once again be happy knowing that we are safe to browse the internet once again.
