Saw this story on Slashdot.
On the one hand, I feel bad for all those users out there who could have all sorts of bad things happen to them, such as identity theft and rampant fraud. But then I remind myself, these people continue to use IE, even after reports of security hole after security hole.
Obviously, it’s not like a new user is even going to know there’s something else out there, but I’m sure the company selling the product knows. Why don’t companies like HP and Dell do what I did for my Grandma? I went over and installed Firefox on the computer, and changed the Desktop icon name to “The Internet”. I then changed the IE desktop icon name to “CLICK FOR VIRUSES”.
So far, it seems to be working. Games on zone.msn.com don’t seem to work under Firefox, but that’s more than offset by the notable lack of popups.
If it works for my grandma, it can work for everybody. Someday these companies are going to have to help their users by making a PC that is safe for Internet browsing, and marketing it as such. Even if you must run Windows, that’s no excuse to not browse safely.