Friday, September 08, 2006

Internet Explorer 6.x More Secure than Firefox 1.x in 2006

Is Browser Security getting better? That is tough to say but Firefox is definitely not leading the way. Despite all the hype, despite all the Myths, Firefox 1.x has a worse security record so far in 2006 than Internet Explorer 6.x.

The popular security site Secunia reports advisories that can include multiple security vulnerabilities of a product. The most severe Firefox Secunia advisories tend to get posted at each version update of the browser. These version update advisories mislead someone looking simply at the advisory totals:

Firefox v1.5.09 - 12/19/06 - SA23282 - 12/19/06 - 10 Vulnerabilities
Firefox v1.5.08 - 11/07/06 - SA22722 - 11/08/06 - 5 Vulnerabilities
Firefox v1.5.07 - 09/14/06 - SA21906 - 09/15/06 - 8 Vulnerabilities
Firefox v1.5.05 - 07/27/06 - SA19873 - 07/27/06 - 13 Vulnerabilities
Firefox v1.5.04 - 06/01/06 - SA20376 - 06/02/06 - 10 Vulnerabilities
Firefox v1.5.02 - 04/12/06 - SA19631 - 04/13/06 - 27 Vulnerabilities



Firefox v1.5.01 - 2/01/06 - SA18700 - 2/02/06 - 8 Vulnerabilities

Simply looking at the advisories between Firefox 1.x in 2006 and Internet Explorer 6.x in 2006 gives a misleading 10 to 14 advisory "win" for Firefox but once you add up the actual vulnerabilities for each it is clear Internet Explorer 6.x has been the more secure browser so far in 2006:

Firefox 1.x - 13 Advisories = 88 Vulnerabilities
Internet Explorer 6.x - 14 Advisories = 36 Vulnerabilities

Winner:


Internet Explorer 6.x more secure than Firefox in 2006.

3 comments:

  1. Walsh of Aran9/10/2006 7:39 PM

    I think Firefox is way over rated although it does have it's strong points.

    Such as a faster surfing experience and I like the platform better than IE.

    But, my pc is always locking up when i use the FF browser so it's back to IE.

    www.pcdoctor2u.com

    ReplyDelete
  2. Tommy Reynolds9/10/2006 9:55 PM

    Nice article. Too bad some people don't get it. FF is less secure than IE. Does it make FF worse than IE? Nope. Just means it is less secure. This is not the only article I have read stating that, in fact I have posted about a couple of them as well. Sure does stir up trouble though.

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  3. Andrew8/18/2007 1:50 AM

    Firefox is not faster than IE, Opera or even Mozilla that is a Myth.

    ReplyDelete