Internet Explorer 8 bests Firefox 3, Chrome 2, Opera 10 and Safari 4 when it comes down to the effectiveness of the security features designed to protect end users against
socially engineered malware and
phishing. With the advent if IE8, Microsoft kicked up a notch the anti-phishing capabilities that were delivered by Internet Explorer 7, and introduced the SmartScreen Filter. It is precisely the added protection of the SmartScreen Filter that makes IE8 stand out of the crowd in terms of user protection, revealed NSS Labs in studies from February and July 2009.
“NSS Labs has just completed a second round of studies on socially engineered malware attacks, and I’m happy to share the results. In this latest test pass, NSS found a 12% improvement in SmartScreen’s protection levels,”
revealed Eric Lawrence, IE PM.
NSS Labs found in the test performed in July 2009 that Internet Explorer 8 RTW stopped no less than 81% out of all attacks involving socially engineered malware, a consistent increase from 69% in February. In fact, IE8 caught 54% more live threats than the runner up Mozilla’s Firefox 3, even though the open-source browser is traditionally perceived as safer than Internet Explorer.
In fact, Firefox’s capacity of stopping socially engineered malware decreased by mid-2009
compared to February. Firefox 3 only blocked 27% of threats in the last month, down 3% from the 30% in February. Next up is Safari, managing to block only 21% of malicious code, also down 3% from the previous study. Chrome only stopped 7% of threats, less than half the percentage at the start of the year. And Opera is in last place, blocking just 1% of socially engineered malware, five times less than the February study.
“We’ve spent quite a bit of time talking about the socially engineered malware threat because it is currently the biggest problem users face. However, phishing remains a prevalent and important threat to users as well. We’re continuously making improvements to our data sources and intelligence systems that deliver phishing protection. This continuous investment keeps IE in the market-leading position it established with the release of the Phishing Filter in IE7. Since then, Internet Explorer 7 and 8 have blocked over 125 million phishing attacks,” Lawrence added.
Internet Explorer 8 also grabbed the top spot for protecting users against phishing attacks. Blocking 83% of attacks, IE8 offers the most comprehensive anti-phishing protection, followed closely by Firefox 3 with 80%. Opera 10 stopped 54% of phishing attempts, Chrome 2 just 26% and Safari 4 only 2%.
Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) RTW is available for download
here (for 32-bit and 64-bit flavors of Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008).
Firefox for Windows is available
here.
The latest development milestone of Google Chrome is available for download
here.
Opera 10.0 is available for download
here.
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