German gov’t warns against IE: Microsoft promises fix

The German government has issued a warning, urging the country’s people not to use Internet Explorer.

No, it’s not because it thinks Microsoft’s stock browser is lame and that anyone using it is a complete technotard. It’s because of a security vulnerability affecting anyone who uses IE 6 to 9.

The government issued the warning after a researcher said he’d found evidence that hackers exploiting the flaw planned to use it to attack defense contractors.

Microsoft says the impact of the flaw has been extremely limited and is reportedly working on a patch to fix it:

There have been an extremely limited number of attacks—the vast majority of Internet Explorer users have not been impacted. We are working on an easy-to-use, one-click fix that will be released in the next few days, but in the meantime we recommend customers make sure their antivirus software is up-to-date.

Once the patch is released, people will have to go to the Microsoft site and install it manually.

Until then, the Redmond-based giant advises that people use an Enhanced Mitigation Experience Toolkit, or EMET, to mitigate the risk of attacks. The toolkit is available through an advisory on the Microsoft site.

The temporary fix is pretty cumbersome. Given the choice though, switching browsers seems a lot simpler.