Ongoing security issues in Internet Explorer have
highlighted the potential value of users supporting other web
browsers to mitigate the security risk.
Several security bodies and industry experts, including the US
government-backed Cert and the non-profit Sans Institute, have
urged companies to consider alternatives including Netscape, Opera,
Mozilla and Apple's Safari.
Richard Brain, technical director at security consultancy
ProCheckup, said, "It is a good idea to use other, safer browsers
such as Firefox by default, and the more complex, buggy Internet
Explorer to access those sites which will only work with it.
Internet Explorer is overly complex and should get back to its
roots as a web browser, so that Microsoft developers can simplify
it and remove its security holes."
Online businesses that follow this advice may have to re-engineer
their websites to make them accessible to all types of browsers.
Phil Cracknell, security consultant at NetSecurity, said he advises
clients to use non-Microsoft web servers based on Unix, Linux and
Netscape together with Microsoft Internet Information Server to
confound hackers. "More obscure operating systems will get hacked
less," he said.
Analysts said it will be possible but not effortless to develop
interactive, animated e-commerce sites which can be viewed on other
browsers.
Bola Rotiba, senior analyst for software development strategy at
Ovum, said it is a myth that websites will not work well in
non-Microsoft browsers. "Why should companies lose any
functionality? There is nothing to say that animations should not
exist [in alternative browsers]," she said.
Rotiba added that translating sites for different browsers can be
straightforward. "It depends on how much abstraction has been done.
Bog-standard HTML can be optimised easily. The question is whether
the site is dynamic or static. If it uses Dynamic HTML and
Cascading Style Sheets, it will take more work," she said.
Mike Prettejohn, director of website analyst Netcraft, said, "I
would not go to the trouble of optimising or tailoring for a
specific browser. When GPRS phone-based internet access becomes
cheaper and more pervasive there will be a case for having content
suitable for small screens."
Stuart Okin, chief security officer at Microsoft, said,
"Essentially all browsers have vulnerabilities." He said that
unlike now, web developers did not need to consider security two to
three years ago. "There is a balance between the richness of the
website and understanding security," he said.
Okin urged users to look at the way their websites have been
developed, and avoid using features such as pop-up windows, which
will be blocked when Windows XP SP2 is introduced.