Web standardistas lament the outdated HTML and CSS support by IE6, but the biggest reason you should drop the browser stat is security, security, security. And if the following evidence from Google, the governments of Germany and France, and Microsoft itself do not convince you, I’m not sure there’s much else that will:
- The Chinese cyber attacks on Google (and at least 20 other large companies) got through because the exploited code worked only in IE6, on Windows 2000 and XP.
- The German and French governments have both asked its citizens to upgrade their IE6 browsers to prevent attacks happening to them.
- Microsoft released a security advisory warning against attacks specifically against Internet Explorer 6.
Mashable includes the three items above in its list, but the last one is the most compelling:
This will not be the last massive IE6 security breach: This flaw was unknown before Google’s groundbreaking China announcement. And it’s not the first flaw ever found with the browser — there are at least 142 vulnerabilities in IE6, 22 of which are not yet patched. Would you use armor that had 142 weak spots?
Internet Explorer 6 is a run-down browser with very little support for exploits. It’s more costly for businesses to leave it lying around like a ticking time bomb than exert effort to upgrade their systems.
The good news is, we’re getting bigger institutions stepping up against IE6. Let’s hope their spheres of influence really are that effective. You can’t get much bigger than European governments, Microsoft, or Google.
Originally posted on January 19, 2010 @ 6:40 pm