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Microsoft Urges Windows Users To Shun Safari

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the big-surprise-there dept.

benjymouse writes "The Register has picked up on a recent Microsoft security bulletin which urges Windows users to 'restrict use of Safari as a web browser until an appropriate update is available from Microsoft and/or Apple.' This controversy comes after Apple has officially refused to promise to do anything about the carpet bombing vulnerability in the Safari browser. Essentially, Apple does not see unsolicited downloads of hundreds or even thousands of executable files to users' desktops as being a security problem." Now while downloading a hundred files to your desktop won't automatically execute them, Microsoft's position is that a secondary attack could execute them for you.

4 of 502 comments (clear)

  1. fox... by canistel · · Score: 1, Troll

    ... said the fox to the hen, "Here, come and sleep in _my_ house instead..."

  2. Microsoft has a point by CosaNostra+Pizza+Inc · · Score: 0, Troll

    As much as I hate M$ and all it stands for, I agree Safari shouldn't be used. Its bad enough that Apple nags me to install Safari and Itunes on my Windows computer whenever there is a Quicktime Player update.

  3. Re:Slightly OT: why corps bother with browsers? by TheRaven64 · · Score: 1, Troll
    The Safari project was started by a former Mozilla developer. He decided that the KHTML core was more maintainable than Gecko (in spite of having more experience with Gecko) and so Apple used that. They now develop it in a public repository and it has Qt and GTK bindings and is used by Nokia in some places and even Adobe in some Windows apps. It has a faster JavaScript engine than Mozilla, and an even faster, experimental, one was just committed. Its CSS support is, in my experience, better, but in terms of pure coverage of the standard they are probably about even. WebKit runs faster and with less memory than Gecko.

    That explains why WebKit rather than Gecko. Why Safari rather than FireFox is obvious to anyone who has used Safari on a Mac - it is a UI disaster with no integration with the platform at all. Even trivial things like the keys used to navigate in a text field are different in FireFox than every other Mac app (e.g. up jumps to the start of a single-line text box in every single OS X app I have installed except FireFox).

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    I am TheRaven on Soylent News
  4. Re:Accidentents. by samkass · · Score: 0, Troll

    Just viewing a web page is "downloading" dozens of files. Nice try though.

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    E pluribus unum