Microsoft is calling for the death of the decade-old and easy-to-exploit Internet Explorer 6.
The software giant has launched The Internet Explorer 6 Countdown ( www.ie6countdown.com ) a campaign to encourage people to ditch the outdated Web browser and update to the newest version, Internet Explorer 8.
“Ten years ago a browser was born. Its name was Internet Explorer 6. Now that we’re in 2011, in an era of modern Web standards, it’s time to say goodbye,” the website reads.
The "death watch" shows a world map coded by the percentage of people still surfing the Web with the decade-old browser. As of last month, 12 percent of the world was still using Internet Explorer 6 (IE6). The goal is to reduce usage to less than 1 percent.
IE6 contains easily-exploitable security flaws that are not present in newer versions, according to the security blog Krebs on Security. Microsoft said a massive shift away from IE6 would save “hours of work for Web developers.”
To help bring about a swift death for IE6, the countdown contains code for a banner that websites can display to tell viewers to upgrade, a hashtag people can use to help spread the message on Twitter and a chart showing the benefits of IE8 compared to IE6.
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