Spyware an Internet Explorer problem?

[polonus]

Hi malware fighters,

Actual percentages may vary, but according to researchers 66% - 90% of Internet users have computers that are spyware infected.

Spyware becomes installed through exploits or drive-by installation. Nearly every time it is an unpatched version of IE that acts as a spyware vector. The users that use alternate open source browsers may surf more or less unhindered by spyware infections. Is spyware exclusively an Internet Explorer problem?

Why a problem, read here the worst case scenario:
http://chooseknowledge.com/Sitemap.htm

polonus

[Dwarden]

not exactly as spyware infestation is like any other danger linked to market % share ...

if You have theoretical 15% IE users , 75% Gecko , 5% Opera 5% rest then of course You will see huge increase in attacks on Gecko to find out it's vulnerable points ...

You think Opera is perfect? close to no bugs no security holes ?

it seems so far but ... it's just because noone from "dark side" considering it worth the effort to research yet

[polonus]

Hi Dwarden,

I cannot deny there is a link between market share and number of infected. But only if there are malware vectors = possibilities aka vulnerabilities.
Now this is not so with Apache versus ISS =  80:15, still Apache has been many times more secure than ISS over the last couple of years. Here your assumption seems to be false.

Only when you use a plug-in to functionally start-up MSIE, you will hit the jackpot. Also from within for instance firefox.

Couldn't it be, that when IE was developed security was not a big thing, and the number of features only grew and grew?

Just consider this funny example and you have to admit the case IE versus alternate browsers is a little more complicated, as you like to assume or what suits you better: http://blogs.zdnet.com/threatchaos/?p=311

greets,

polonus

[essexboy]

Ooops wrong thread