Posts Tagged ‘competition’

The Pwn2Own hacking competition is going to prove bad for Apple Safari web browser because the experts believe that this browser has got maximum number of security loopholes. The Safari browser is likely to be hacked multiple times at the contest. This is because it’s a user friendly web browser and supports lots of formats and applications. So, the chances of bugs also increase.

Charlie Miller, the white-hat hacker who successfully cracked an Apple MacBook Air at the last year’s Pwn2Own competition believes that this time the Safari browser will be hacked by at least four hackers. The browser’s security features are so weak that anyone can easily remotely install malware on the handhelds running Safari. Therefore, Miller says that the safari will be the first to fall and he also says that the Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox will throw a real challenge in front of the contestants. Apart from Safari, Google Chrome is also supposed to be an easy target for hackers.

Miller said, “It’s (Safari) an easy target. Apple’s products are really friendly to users, and Safari is designed to handle anything, including all kinds of file formats. With a lot of functionality comes the increased chance of bugs. The more complex software is, the less secure it is.”

Since the launch of the Apple Safari web browser for Microsoft’s Windows operating system, the browser has faced many ups and downs. Initially the browser was accused of being vulnerable to online threats. The company rectified the problem as soon as a buzz was created regarding that, but still the browser has not been optimised to a great extent so that it can win the hearts of the masses.

Ok! Apple has done a great job by making Safari for Windows faster than the Microsoft Internet Explorer and Mozilla Firefox but what about it’s new born competitor, the Google Chrome? Tests showed that when it comes to handling the java scripts the Chrome leaves Safari in the dust completely. Just like Google challenged the Apple iPhone 3G with its T-Mobile G1 Google Anroid based mobile phone, so is the search engine company challenging Apple on the browser level as well. Although both Chrome and Safari are based on the same web browsing engine called WebKit, which is an open source project, Google has taken Chrome to a next higher level by optimizing it for the java script based web sites. The company did it by tweaking the java script engine used in Chrome and yes, the Chrome operates at an amazing speed while handling the java scripts. However, this is not the case with the Windows version of the Safari.

One of the main reasons of focusing exclusively on the java script handling capabilities of the Chrome is that the Google wanted its web browser an ideal one for running the Google web applications which mostly make use of java script. Alas! The Apple did not optimise the Safari for any one specialised job. So, it’s high time to revise the Safari once again before the Chrome takes away a lions share out of the web browser’s market.