Microsoft’s Internet Explorer 9 beta release, which became available for download Wednesday, integrates several new features that improve security and privacy and give PC users greater control over the browser’s impact on PC performance. On the security side, for example, IE9 delivers significant new protections against malicious and poorly written web sites that threaten the online safety and privacy of PC users.
With IE9, appropriately signed executable files that are frequently downloaded from the web will run without a warning prompt. However, if the selected executable file is not a commonly downloaded program, IE9 will notify the user that it could be harmful, noted Internet Explorer General Manager Dean Hachamovitch.
“IE9’s download manager is like an early warning system against malware that is based on application reputation,” Hachamovitch said Wednesday. “That’s a nice way to say stranger danger for downloads.”
Empowering Browser Users
Like other web browsers, the IE9 beta features a combined address bar where users can type web addresses as well as start searches — but with one notable difference, Hachamovitch observed. “IE9 respects your privacy and doesn’t send your keystrokes to search services by default,” he said. “But it’s under my control and I can very easily, with one click, turn that on, and I’ll get suggestions.”
For PC performance, IE9 beta notifies PC users when add-ons are slowing their browsing sessions. “Add-ons cause 75 percent of all crashes in Internet Explorer,” Hachamovitch said. IE9 makes it very clear what’s going on so that the user can decide whether to disable add-ons that are less useful or too slow, he added.
By pinning favorite web sites to the PC task bar, users will be able to speed up web interactions by accessing frequently visited pages directly from the desktop without first opening the browser. Moreover, the web site’s…