http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7784908.stm Users of Microsoft's Internet Explorer are being urged by experts to switch to a rival until a serious security flaw has been fixed. The flaw in Microsoft's Internet Explorer could allow criminals to take control of people's computers and steal their passwords, internet experts say. Microsoft urged people to be vigilant while it investigated and prepared an emergency patch to resolve it. Internet Explorer is used by the vast majority of the world's computer users. "Microsoft is continuing its investigation of public reports of attacks against a new vulnerability in Internet Explorer," said the firm in a security advisory alert about the flaw. Microsoft says it has detected attacks against IE 7.0 but said the "underlying vulnerability" was present in all versions of the browser. Other browsers, such as Firefox, Opera, Chrome, Safari, are not vulnerable to the flaw Microsoft has identified. As many as 10,000 websites have been compromised since last week to take advantage of the security flaw, said antivirus software maker Trend Micro. The websites have been mostly serving up programs that steal computer game passwords, but the flaw could be "adopted by more financially motivated criminals", a Trend Micro security researcher said on Monday. Richard Cox, chief information officer of anti-spam body The Spamhaus Project and an expert on privacy and cyber security, echoed Trend Micro's warning. "It won't be long before someone reverse engineers this exploit for more fraudulent purposes. Trend Mico's advice [of switching to an alternative web browser] is very sensible," he said. PC Pro magazine's security editor, Darien Graham-Smith, said that there was a virtual arms race going on, with hackers always on the look out for new vulnerabilities. "The message needs to get out that this malicious code can be planted on any web site, so simple careful browsing isn't enough." "It's a shame Microsoft have not been able to fix this more quickly, but letting people know about this flaw was the right thing to do. If you keep flaws like this quiet, people are put at risk without knowing it." "Every browser is susceptible to vulnerabilities from time to time. It's fine to say 'don't use Internet Explorer' for now, but other browsers may well find themselves in a similar situation," he added. MICROSOFT SECURITY ADVICE Change IE security settings to high (Look under Tools/Internet Options) Switch to a Windows user account with limited rights to change a PC's settings With IE7 or 8 on Vista turn on Protected Mode Ensure your PC is updated Keep anti-virus and anti-spyware software up to date
thanks for that mate .. how do you , "With IE7 or 8 on Vista turn on Protected Mode" ? thanks in advance.
Keep an eye on here for details on the fix. http://www.microsoft.com/technet/security/bulletin/ms08-dec.mspx
Have just done the update. Even though I prefer Mozilla still useful to have a version of IE on the 'puter
should be an automatic update, next time you turn off your pc it will / should say installing updates
The update should come through to your computer if you have your security settings set to allow automatic updates. If you want to force an update follow this link using Internet Explorer Hope this helps