I just posted an article about Internet Explorer 8 security features. This is based on a recent briefing I had, but as promised, the IE team has published a number of related blog posts that might be of interest:
IE8 Security Part III – SmartScreen Filter
For Internet Explorer 8, we’ve built upon the success of the Phishing Filter feature (which blocks over a million phishing attacks weekly) to develop the SmartScreen Filter, a replacement that improves upon the Phishing Filter in a number of important ways:
- Improved user interface
- Faster performance
- New heuristics & enhanced telemetry
- Anti-Malware support
- Improved Group Policy support
IE8 Security Part IV – The XSS Filter
Today we are releasing some details on a new IE8 feature that makes reflected / "Type-1" Cross-Site Scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities much more difficult to exploit from within Internet Explorer 8. Type-1 XSS flaws represent a growing portion of overall reported vulnerabilities and are increasingly being exploited "for fun and profit."
IE8 Security Part V – Comprehensive Protection
As we were planning Internet Explorer 8, our security teams looked closely at the common attacks in the wild and the trends that suggest where attackers will be focusing their attention next. While we were building new Security features, we also worked hard to ensure that powerful new features (like Activities and Web Slices) minimize attack surface and don’t provide attackers with new targets. Out of our planning work, we classified threats into three major categories: Web Application Vulnerabilities, Browser & Add-on Vulnerabilities, and Social Engineering Threats. For each class of threat, we developed a set of layered mitigations to provide defense-in-depth protection against exploits.
