The long twilight of IE6

[Jerry Leichter]

We discussed the question of why IE6 is still out there.  Well ... http://arstechnica.com/microsoft/news/2010/08/despite-petition-uk-government-to-keep-ie6.ars 
  reports that the UK government has officially decided not to replace  
IE6, feeling the costs outweigh the benefits.  Quoting from the  
government response:

"Complex software will always have vulnerabilities and motivated  
adversaries will always work to discover and take advantage of them.  
There is no evidence that upgrading away from the latest fully patched  
versions of Internet Explorer to other browsers will make users more  
secure. Regular software patching and updating will help defend  
against the latest threats. The Government continues to work with  
Microsoft and other internet browser suppliers to understand the  
security of the products used by HMG, including Internet Explorer and  
we welcome the work that Microsoft are continuing do on delivering  
security solutions which are deployed as quickly as possible to all  
Internet Explorer users....

It is not straightforward for HMG departments to upgrade IE versions  
on their systems. Upgrading these systems to IE8 can be a very large  
operation, taking weeks to test and roll out to all users. To test all  
the web applications currently used by HMG departments can take months  
at significant potential cost to the taxpayer. It is therefore more  
cost effective in many cases to continue to use IE6 and rely on other  
measures, such as firewalls and malware scanning software, to further  
protect public sector internet users."

                                                         -- Jerry



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