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IE6 Still Going Strong In China
RackNine writes "Net Applications estimates that IE6 has a share of 33.8% in China, StatCounter estimates about 40.2%. Consider the fact that there are currently about 477 million Internet users in China and you get 160 to 192 million IE6 users. That is potentially more than all Internet users in Africa and the Middle East combined (187 million)."
...and StatCounter also reports that Windows XP - the most frequently pirated OS in existence - is still powering along at 81% Coincidence? Nay, I think not: http://www.troyhunt.com/2010/08/aye-pirates-be-reason-ie6-just-wont-die.html
Microsoft MVP - Developer Security
doesn't need more explaining than that. also these stats are nothing new, the last time there was blabla confirms it browser blablychro has a blabla marketshare, the stats included these as well.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Is it any wonder why so many botnets command zombie legions in China?
Is it also any wonder why so much high-profile hacking originates from inside China? (undoubtedly a lot of it does come from Chinese efforts, but anybody that's interested in hacking high-profile targets can just route themselves through China, too)
That's kind of funny in comparison to my little corner of the US. On a gardening site I run (so non-techie) I'm currently seeing IE with a 42% market share total. This is down from 51% a year ago, and somewhere around 65% the year before that.
#DeleteChrome
They may just be too lazy to figure out how to activate which can be pretty complex if you're not willing to pay. Which means they may be stuck with SP1 or even worse no service pack. I can't remember if Firefox 3+ requires a service pack or not but I know a lot of applications require Windows XP SP2.
"...about the size of two football fields, or your average restraining order". -- Adam Savage
Why always comparing numbers to the size or anything else? In all media there is always the "it's about the size of ..." quote that always seems it does not mean anything related to the subject discussed.
I know, completely unrelated subject. I missed it by about that much.
--- Bouh !!! ---
It's only IE8+ that doesn't run on XP.
All the others run on XP and several of them will still run on 2000 and even 95/98.
The problem is that activeX seems to be very popular in Chinese websites.
I'm not sure why you'd care, unless it's that there's that many zombied botnet computers in China already pwned by IE6 vulnerabilities.
Those users are useless as far as users/views go to anyone but the Chinese government and websites inside China. If Microsoft thinks they can benefit by grovelling and playing nice they'll just get their Google-chasing asses kicked harder later.
IE9+ actually.
Chinese websites don't support Firefox, so that's where it ends. E.g. to make payments with Alipay/Taobao you need IE specific ActiveX plugins.
(Actually they will have unofficial firefox and even linux plugins, but it's hard to find and troublesome to install.)
The next 10 versions of FireFox will still support XP. That should cover us till the end of next week.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
Banks and most e-commerce websites require ActiveX controls thanks to export bans on encryption back in the 1990s. SSL is not preferred as it was only 64 bit until a few years ago. This was also way Apple gave up on Korea a few years back, as Macs were useless due to every site that needed SSL simply required ActiveX a decade ago and most still do today.
Requiring genuine copies of XP prevents Windows Update to upgrade these users to IE 8 which is much better than IE 6 and at least considered a modern 2009/2010 era browser. IE 8 is popular in China too but most versions of cracked XP still ship with IE 6 and are impossible to upgrade.
http://saveie6.com/
Just a thought, but isn't this because China mainly uses the Maxthon browser, which uses IE6 as its engine (or at least used to, for a looong time)? They built a browser on top of IE6 that has tabs and other modern things, so the user experience isn't as completely shit as plain old IE6.
Me too!
But then again, I work in IT security and make a living fighting malware, so my view might be skewed...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
"The massively conservative won't switch until almost everybody else does, it's pointless to look to them for early adopters.
"
The issue is the massively conservative are becoming the new moderate majority. I am quite shocked to read all the pro Windows XP posts here on slashdot. Slashdot users are the ones who *should* welcome change more and experiment before the average users. If half the users here prefer Firefox 3.6 and Windows XP then these tech giants and I.T. consultants are in trouble.
If I had a time machine back in 2001, and told everyone that the majority of slashdot users and the world perfer 10 year old operating systems in the future people would laugh. It is the equilivent of turning down Windows XP for Windows 3.0 when it was new. That would have been ludcrious. Today, this is common sense and mainstream. Is it the recession?
Get with the program and stop whining if newer versions of your apps or your kinetic thingie or IE 9 wont run on a decade old platform. It is kike whining that MS Office 2000 wont run on Dos or Windows 3.0.
China is a much poorer country and I understand this. However it near impossible for any modern browser to get above a 4 or 6% marketshare as web developers live a a decade in the past and so do its citizens. This is plain silly.
http://saveie6.com/
Rendering is not the issue, the main problem is custom activex which is pushed even from government web sites.
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
Maxthon and other popular chinese browsers happily identify themselves as IE6
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
Funny you should mention that as Windows 7 is easier to pirate than XP ever was. In fact not only is Windows 7 easier to pirate ( the hacked version floating around doesn't even need a code, and has all versions from Starter to Ultimate on the disc) but if you look up "Tiny7 Rev 09" you'll find a version of Windows 7 that uses less memory than XP while keeping most of the bling except the see through taskbar. How the hell those guys did it I don't know, but I decided to give it a spin on an old off lease office box I was gonna have to wipe anyway. We're talking about a 1.6Ghz with 512Mb of old SDRAM and damned if the OS isn't fricking peppy!
As for TFA maybe someone in China can answer this next question: Is your banking tied to IE 6 like Korea? I know Korea has been stuck on IE 6 for awhile due to using ActiveX to get around the crypto export rules. Maybe China has the same problem?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
Well as a PC repairman I can't comment on the Chinese but I CAN comment on why there is all these "WinXP Razr1911 SP2 corp edition" with no patches...WGA. The pirates KNOW how to update without getting WGA'ed. The people they sell the boxes to? So don't have a clue. So the pirates simply disable all the updates and there ya go. The user thinks their PC is getting slower because it is getting older when in reality it is getting ever increasing piles of malware.
The current record for malware on a single box at the shop was a Compaq desktop which had 2836 pieces of malware and took over an hour and a half to boot. Yeah I could have just wiped it but I wanted to see if I beat my old boss' record of 1931 bugs on a single box, which I did. It was a whitebox that had Razr1911 SP2 on it and this was last year, not a single update since SP2 was released.
So I wouldn't be surprised that the locals are getting Razr'd and are simply clicking on "The big blue E" which they believe means Internet. I actually had an argument once with a girl who wanted to know why she couldn't check her email because the machine I sold her "had the Internet in it!" and when I asked WTF she was talking about she actually thought the big blue E would magically give her the Internet without needing anything else.
As my old boss used to say "Boy you may think you've seen the dumbest computer user but trust me, every time you think the stupidity couldn't get any deeper someone will happily come and prove you wrong" and no truer words have been spoken. Expecting these folks who haven't even updated IE to know about alternative browsers? Yeah and pull this leg it plays jingle bells.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
As for TFA maybe someone in China can answer this next question: Is your banking tied to IE 6 like Korea?
For most banks that matter, yes. For odd reasons the password field uses ActiveX.
I thought it was mostly Windows XP without some SP's with also do not support activation and thus have no IE7 or IE8.
Retail and system builder (small OEM) copies of XP require activation
volume license versions of XP don't require activation
Big brand OEM versions of XP don't require activation if appropriate BIOS keys are present but will demand activation if those BIOS keys are not present.
All of the above applies regardless of service pack. What did change in XP's lifecycle was that MS introduced key blacklisting and WGA to try and root out those that were using volume license versions with leaked or generated keys. The easiest way for a pirate to minimise the risk that their customers run afoul of this stuff is to disable automatic updates.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
For odd reasons the password field uses ActiveX.
Might it have something to do with historical limits on the strength of encryption that can be exported from the United States to China?