Why It’s PayPal’s Fault, Not The Browser

April 27, 2008

About a week ago there was some buzz floating around about how may block because it doesn’t have phishing protection built in. This has since been retracted by :

: No plans to block

A representative for on Friday said the ecommerce firm is developing features to block customers from logging into when using obsolete browsers on outdated or unsupported operating systems, but has no intention of blocking as a company white paper seemed to imply. 

“An example of such a browser/OS combination might be, for example, Internet Explorer 4 running on Windows 98,” said spokesperson Michael Oldenburg. “In doing so, we better protect our customers from viewing a phishing site through their browser. We have absolutely no intention of blocking current versions of any browsers, including ’s , from our website.”

(Nugget by AppleInsider)

Might I suggest that it’s not the browser’s to block security threats on particular web sites? Maybe it’s my not-liking of blaming others for your own problems but I believe that and only is responsible for their own .com site. It’s their job to keep their customers safe, not browser developers, or any other type of web application developer.

Sure, I have a little bit of a bias here. I used to be a large (in my mind) merchant, who ditched all that in favor of better customer service elsewhere. I know I’m not alone in that boat. However, I feel the same way when blames or denies support of the site if you’re using on .

(Wait a second, I may be on to something here, both and are owned by and both were virtually run into the ground under Meg Whitman).

To close out this ranting post, let me say that I fully support web application developers and browser developers who want to protect their own customers from the dark side of the Internet, but I don’t think the fault and should lie on their shoulders as opposed to a multi-national corporation who certainly has the tools and resources available to help themselves help the world but chooses not to.

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Posted by Jonathan | Filed Under Blog 

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