Internet Explorer 8

It’s looking to be a good Halloween for developers. Windows 7 share continues to climb, and as early as next month, IE9 on Windows 7 could be the leading modern browser behind IE8.  For developers this means that most Windows 7 users have a modern browser capable of running exciting, interoperable, HTML5 experiences - allowing developers to use the same markup across their websites.

You may have seen articles recently that highlight a social engineering technique called “cookiejacking” and how a particular instance may currently affect Internet Explorer.

It’s important to note that we have not seen widespread attacks related to this specific case. However we take security very seriously and to ensure customers are protected, we are working on an update to Internet Explorer.

Since its availability on March 14th, IE9 has been available for manual download and we are pleased by the early and continued enthusiasm for IE9.  We are seeing not only strong customer and business demand, but some of the highest web and application compatibility rates in IE history, not to mention all the sites that are taking advantage of HTML5 and IE9’s Windows 7 integration.  On March 28^th, we began to upgrade ex

Last month, we saw share of both Internet Explorer 8 and 9 grow, and we’re pleased to see that momentum continue in February with the availability of the IE9 Release Candidate.  Since its release on February 10^th, the IE9 RC has already been downloaded over 11 million times.  Together with the IE9 Beta, IE9 has been downloaded over 36 million times since its initial availability on September 15, 2010.

Every month, the IE team gets a bunch of questions asking about our take on market share trends and Internet Explorer.  This month, I connected with Scott Armstrong to answer some of these.  Check out our conversation below (or at this link).

As 2010 comes to an end, we wanted to take a look at the changes this last year in the IE world.  At end of 2009, IE 6 and IE7 accounted for 38.51% of internet users, while IE8 had 24.15% of users worldwide.  Fast forward twelve months later, IE6 and IE7 have shed over 40% of users and now only account for 22.98% of users worldwide - with IE6 hitting an all-time low of 13.81%.  IE8 usage on the other hand has increased by almost 40% during the same time.  Combined with the near half-percent of users of newly introduced IE9 Beta, the modern Internet Explorer browsers now account for

Assess your environment and plan for Windows 7

Now available, the Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Toolkit 5.5 Beta.

I’m a week late posting about this but I felt that it’s such an important topic that I should go ahead and still post despite being late. 20 years ago last Monday, the Americans with Disabilities Act was signed into law. With current estimates of 20% or more of the U.S. population having some level of disability, I thought it I would take a moment to highlight some of the work we’ve done in Windows 7 to make it universally accessible to everyone including those with disabilities.

Users are continuously getting smarter and more educated about the things criminals are doing on the web. Because of this, the criminals have to change their tactics. One of the ways they are doing this is by buying ads on prominent web sites, and finding ways to serve up malicious content through those ads. Some of these websites might be some of your favorite websites you visit regularly and you might be thinking “hey, I only visit good websites” – unfortunately even “good” websites (websites not intending to harm the reader in any way) can be affected.

Posted on half of Pete LePage on the Internet Explorer team.

Protecting Windows customers is an absolute priority for the Internet Explorer engineering team.  That's why we work hard to make sure our browser has some of the best safety and privacy features available today.  We've spent a lot of time talking about some of the more visible safety and privacy features like our SmartScreen Filter, that protects users from socially engineered malware and phishing attacks; or the InPrivate features that put you in control of how you share your information.