Security & Privacy + Software & Apps

A group of researchers (from the Computer Engineering and Networks Laboratory in Zurich, Google and IBM) have published the results of a survey of web browser usage, and suggest that Firefox users are more secure than others. They base this on the fact that Firefox users are more likely to have the latest (and most secure) version of their browser. “We believe the auto-update mechanism as implemented within Firefox to be the most efficient patching mechanism of the Web browsers studied. Firefox’s mechanism regularly polls an online authority to verify whether a new version of the Web browser is available and typically prompts the user to update if a new version exists. With a single click (assuming that the user has administrative rights on the host), the update is downloaded and installed.”

Some 83% of Firefox users, the study found, are surfing with the latest version of the browser, compared with 65% of Safari users (that’s Mac and Windows together), 56% of Opera users and a mere 47% of Internet Explorer users. (The study focused on users of both Macs and Windows PCs.) Yet one in six Firefox users don’t update their browser, in spite of this ease of updating. As for the Safari figure, they don’t split Mac and Windows users. Mac users are probably more likely to update to new versions, because of the Software Update mechanism integrated in Mac OS X; Windows users have an updater, but it’s easier to ignore, since it only provides updates for Apple software: Safari, iTunes and QuickTime.