14 DAY TRIAL // A week after Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 got hit by a critical vulnerability, security research firm NSS Labs rolled out a study to reveal that this particular IE version is actually very secure.
Security experts examined the security features of four leading browsers, namely Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari, with IE 9 performing the best when it comes to malware protection.
Each browser was tested with all available updates installed on Windows 7 workstations, the security firm guarantees. And the results are rather surprising.
Internet Explorer 9 blocked 95 percent of malicious activity, NSS Labs said in a press review, while Chrome came second with 33 percent. Safari and Firefox block less than 6 percent, which is a bit worrying given their market share at this moment.
The click fraud malware tests again brought Internet Explorer 9’s security features in the spotlight, as Microsoft’s browser blocked 96.6 percent of this particular threat. Again, Chrome was placed second with 1.6 percent, while Firefox and Safari blocked 0.8 and 0.7 percent, respectively.
“Given Chrome’s prominence and increasing market share, we predict ongoing increases in click fraud unless Google takes serious steps to improve its click fraud protection,” said Dr. Stefan Frei, research director at NSS Labs.
Internet Explorer 9 was recently affected by a critical security flaw that allowed attackers to execute malicious codes on the vulnerable computers, stealing private data and compromising sensitive information. Microsoft reacted very quickly and issued a fix in less than 3 days, which made security experts believe that the Redmond-based firm actually knew about the bug since July.