Recently, a friend of ours who works for a major industrial corporation mentioned the company's stubborn insistence on using Internet Explorer 6. Exasperated employees who've installed IE7 or IE8 have met with harsh words from the IT department, he told us.

Why? Because the folks in charge haven't bothered to vet the newer browsers, which therefore remain unapproved by IT.

This is getting ridiculous, folks. As we've mentioned before, IE6 poses significant security risks compared with IE7 and especially IE8. Need proof? Check out last week's Ars Technica story, "IE6 and IE7 vulnerable to latest flaw; IE8 immune." Here's an excerpt:

Under certain conditions, it is possible for a CSS/Style object to be accessed after the object is deleted, and thus, if Internet Explorer attempts to access the supposedly freed object, it can end up running attacker-supplied code. IE6 SP1 on Windows 2000 SP4, as well as IE6 and IE7 on supported editions of Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, and Windows Server 2008 are affected.

What about IE8? "Not affected," according to Microsoft. This is par for the course: The longer companies cling to IE6, the more dangerous it becomes.

So what are you waiting for? IE8 is free, easy to deploy, and infinitely more secure than IE6. Its learning curve is slight, especially considering that many workers are already using it at home.

If you can cite one good reason your organization is sticking with IE6, we'd love to hear it. In the meantime, here's more on the subject:

• Internet Explorer 8: Best at Blocking Malware


• How to Deploy and Manage Internet Explorer 8


• Hacker Exploit Targets XP, IE6, IE7