On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 9:42 AM, Amol Hatwar <[email protected]>wrote:
> > On Jan 20, 2010, at 9:28 AM, Nagarjuna G wrote: > > > On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 7:30 AM, Swapnil Bhartiya <[email protected]> > wrote: > >> The French government has joined the German government and suggested its > >> citizens stay away from Microsoft's Internet explorer. This is a welcome > >> move considering the security risk Microsoft's Internet Explorer > creates. > >> Similar action may be taken against other Microsoft products as well. > >> > >> In addition to warning citizens to stay away from Internet Explorer, > >> governments should also consider blocking Microsoft from bundling > Windows > >> operating systems with PCs. > >> > >> > http://katonda.com/blog/548/why-governments-should-ban-microsoft-internet-explorer > >> > > > > good one, see my blog post at http://gnowgi.org/ > > > > I was recently telling a Govt-sector employee about these decisions in the > EU. He retorted > "We can't all use GNU/Linux ". > Much of the responsibility for this arises from our security sector, who are far more concerned with 'visible' signs of security, such as gun-toting (albeit bulletless) VIP escorts, than to actually protecting the real and virtual bounds of our region, doing much of which is 'under the scanner' and therefore does not make for good media bites. > > The point being that alternatives like Firefox and Google Chrome are not > that well known. > Also, software that is free (as in price) in the Windows is taken with > great suspicion. In the > corporate environment, users don't have rights to install tools/software on > their systems. > Head of IT/Network Admin takes the call. People want to switch, but they > aren't allowed or > aren't aware. > As many people have reported (I read this stuff all the time) simply putting an icon (shortcut) on the desktop and calling it 'Internet' is good enough for most users who are, as you point out, not familiar with the less well known Firefox and Chrome. Unfortunately, it does take a little effort to do this for every desktop, but the EU directive to vendors to keep the IE icon off the desktop will go a long way, this year, to safeguarding users in those countries. As we have seen in the Google/China problem, this means eventually safeguarding security around the world. > > Surely, we must all take efforts in popularizing and spreading the word. > Especially so when news items like these come out... > Incomplete software is only important when it becomes economically mission-critical, be it free or expensive, right? And web-enabling software is becoming increasingly mission-critical. That is the (not very pleasant) reality of the current situation. -- Vickram http://communicall.wordpress.com
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