The day Europe turned on Internet Explorer

To stay with IE or not?

First it was Germany, but now the French government has followed suit saying that citizens should switch to an alternative browser other than Internet Explorer for security reasons.

After the recent attacks on Google's systems which Microsoft admitted may have occurred through Internet Explorer's, the German Federal Office for Information Security issued a warning to web users to find an alternative browser to Internet Explorer to protect security.

While Microsoft rejected the warning, saying that the risk to users was low and that the browsers' increased security setting would prevent any serious risk, the German authorities did not agree... and now it appears, the French don't either.

The French group CERTA (Centre d'Expertise Gouvernemental de Réponse et de Traitement des Attaques informatique) has concurred with their European neighbours saying that Internet Explorer 6, 7 and 8 all share a similar vulnerability, which allows malicious hackers to remotely execute arbitrary code.

The solution? Switch to another browser.

"Pending a patch from the publisher, Certa recommends using an alternative browser," it said.

Blow to Microsoft

In a market where Microsoft has been losing customers to other browsers such as Firefox and Safari, this has come as a major blow.While these browsers are not hacker-proof, the online community has often said they are safer alternatives.

As a result, Microsoft have been rallying their troubles to minimise the damage. Thomas Baumgaertner, a spokesman for Microsoft in Germany, said that while they were aware of the warning by the European governments, they did not agree with it, saying that the attacks on Google were by "highly motivated people with a very specific agenda".

"These were not attacks against general users or consumers," said Mr Baumgaertner to the BBC.

"There is no threat to the general user, consequently we do not support this warning," he added.

He added that the company had discovered that the security hole can be shut by setting the browser's security zone to "high", but this limits functionality and blocks many websites.

Security firms have however been warning people that other browsers have security flaws and that switching away from Internet Explorer may cause other problems.

Speaking to BBC News, Graham Cluley of security firm Sophos also pointed out that "some web-based applications may not work at all if you're not using Internet Explorer."

Microsoft have said that while they are working on a patch, a time-frame cannot be confirmed.

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