According to a report released on Tuesday, more than 40 percent of Internet
surfers don't use browsers with up-to-date security patches -- and Internet
Explorer users are the biggest culprits.
The report, "Understanding
the Web Browser Threat," was conducted by researchers at ETH Zurich,
Google Inc. and IBM Internet Security Services. Its main assertion is that Web
browsers -- such as IE, Firefox and Safari -- are often the weakest link in
the security configuration of a given workstation.
IE took hits throughout the report, which claimed that the gestation time between
Microsoft patch releases is too long compared to similar programs from Apple
and others. In fact, according to the report, IE came in dead last in terms
of security, with only 47.6 percent of its users having the latest security
patches.