Mozilla's Firefox Web browser has been gaining market share against
Microsoft Internet Explorer for years now. However, in 2008 it surpassed IE in
a far less glorious category: number of bugs.
According to browser
vulnerability research by Secunia, (PDF) 115 security vulnerabilities in
Firefox were reported in 2008—nearly twice as many as IE and Apple Safari
combined. However, the news is not all bad, as the same report showed that
Mozilla was much quicker to respond than Microsoft when flaws were publicly
disclosed either prior to or without vendor notification.
Three Firefox vulnerabilities were publicized last year under those
conditions. All three were patched, with the longest patch taking 86 days to
arrive, according to Secunia. For IE, however, only three of the six such vulnerabilities
were patched as of Dec. 31. One of the IE vulnerabilities remained
open for 294 days in 2008, according to the report.
The report noted that not all vulnerabilities are created equal. The three
aforementioned Firefox flaws were rated "less critical," while the
Microsoft vulnerabilities were more of a mixed bag. The three unpatched IE
flaws were rated either "not critical" or "less critical."
Two of the patched bugs were classified as "moderate" and "high,"
while the third patched bug was considered "less critical."
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