Browser Security Breaches Drive Home the Value of Additional Protection
At a recent computer security conference in Canada, the winner of a hacking contest managed to breach Safari, the newest version of Internet Explorer, and Firefox in a matter of hours. A University of Oldenburg student named Nils said "It's not as easy as a few years ago," but he nonetheless demonstrated that each of the Web's most popular browsers are vulnerable.
In a separate event, a security expert won $5,000 for exploiting a security hole in Safari in about ten seconds.
The take-home message from this rather sobering news is that you should always keep an eye out for the latest updates to your browser, because developers are constantly enhancing their products' security. Failing to install updates can result in hackers exploiting known security holes. And additionally, relying solely on the your browser to protect you can seriously compromise your computer.
In order to really stand up to Internet security threats, you need to practice sound surfing habits and have a second layer of good anti-virus and anti-malware security beyond what comes with your browser.
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