Nipping at the heels of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 launch just last week, we now have Mozilla’s Firefox 4.0 taking a bow on the browser podium.
Firefox 4.0 packs a number of new features geared to improve user experience. Loading times, security, and the ability to sync bookmarks, passwords and browsing history between computers and devices have all been addressed.
With Firefox’s estimated 22% of the browser market currently under its belt, compared to IE’s 57%, these two new browsers show that neither team are ready to give up the fight for greater market share just yet. And we users are the ones who benefit from this race – particularly when they slap in cool new features for us to play with.
A quick look at some of the new security features in this version of Firefox 4.0:
Instant Web Site ID: Gives users an icon to verify a sites’ legitimacy.
Content Security Policy: Designed to shut down cross-site scripting attacks by providing a mechanism for sites to explicitly tell the browser which content is legitimate.
Secure Updates: Looks for a secure connection before Firefox installs or updates add-ons and third-party software.
Anti-Malware: Warns you away from a site which it detects as hosting malicious content.
Do Not Track: Allows you to transmit a “Do Not Track HTTP” header to websites, opting you out of behavioral tracking.
Its good to see that browsers are beginning to have some sort of hardened security out of the box, but I'm keeping noscript just to be safe (even in my mac) even if it makes FF4 a bit unstable.
Good news is I can wear a smaller tinfoil hat.
Thanks for the update. Just updated to FF4. I like it. 🙂
IE9 = Miscrosoft – Think their gods and try to rule all that is software.
Chrome = Google – "Google's aim is to stay just this side of creepy", Monitor everything and know far to much.
FF4 = Mozilla – Open web foundation that aims to keep the net free and safe.
Personally Ill be supporting FireFox forever.
YOu fogot Opera and their opera browser 😀
Typing from IE9.
Personally, I think due to the competation, IE and other browsers are getting better
Here comes the grammar police!
"Think their gods"
^ they're
"know far to much"
^ too
"Ill be supporting"
^ I'll
And on a (slightly!) pedantic note, it's "Firefox", not "FireFox".
Firefox for me!
Only problem is the tab sync, can't seem to get it working. :/
@ Richard; Google has to "try" and be not-creepy. Public outrage due to some huge scandal can quickly destroy any empire.
It just has to be "bad enough".
i just got hit with rogue AV with FF4 just 1-2 hours ago so this line:
"Anti-Malware: Warns you away from a site which it detects as hosting malicious content."
means nothing to me. i dont blame FF4 as i should of had my AV enabled with a firewall but still i was hoping FF4 was not vulnerable to drive by attacks. i love its new speed i can tell its improved and its 10x more stable then FF3.
I think that leads us all to question your choice in websites. Of course FF4 can't detect all sites with malware on them. That's not possible. And your AV was disabled? Lol.
It definitely does show improved speed though, you're right about that.
"Instant Web Site ID: Gives users an icon to verify a sites' legitimacy."
So, what does clicking on the nakedsecurity icon do:
"This web site does not supply ownership information."
Hmmm.
I wouldn't know what IE is up to since I can't afford to just go out and buy a computer that can run whatever version of windows it is that you need to be able to run the latest IE. I switched to FireFox after the newest version of IE I can use is too out of date and I can't use it for certain websites or every shows up kinda screwy.