Why do you advise against using Internet Explorer 6?

Internet Explorer 6 is a web browser from Microsoft, originally released in 2001.  Upon its original release it offered a lot of features and improvements that weren't available in previous versions or in browsers from competitors, but a lot of time has passed since 2001.  As time has gone by, faults (known as bugs in technical circles) have been discovered in Internet Explorer 6. It is also missing features that are available in more modern browsers

Some of these bugs affect how Internet Explorer presents pages, causing the page the browser actually displays to differ in appearance from what the specifications say it should look like. 

More serious by far, bugs have been discovered that compromise how Internet Explorer 6 handles security, meaning data that should be kept private by the browser can be leaked out and exposed to people who shouldn't be able to see it. 

Finally, bugs exist in Internet Explorer 6 that allow software to be installed on your computer without your permission or knowledge, this has been used over the years by criminals to install software that can do anything from damage your computer to leak private data, or make your computer an unwitting participant in criminal activity under remote control. 

At PC World Business, we take great pains to provide the best user experience possible regardless of the browser you use, however keeping compatible with Internet Explorer 6 limits what we can do with the user experience, and it means that we cannot fully guarantee that personal data you enter on our site will remain private.

Microsoft has already release a newer version of internet explorer, version 7, which addresses many of the issues present in Internet Explorer 6.  It is also preparing to release another newer version 8, which improves the situation further. 

Microsoft are not the only supplier of web browsers, Mozilla FireFox, Apple's Safari and Opera are all alternatives which are available for free for Windows, Mac OS and several other computing platforms such as Linux.  All of these browsers offer a more modern web browsing experience than Internet Explorer 6, conform more fully to web standards and most importantly offer more security.  If you are using Internet Explorer 6, then we strongly recommend you upgrade to version 7, or switch to one of these alternative browsers. 

• Install Internet Explorer 7
• Install FireFox
• Install Opera
• Install Safari