Don’t be a browser wars victim

Your computer has become part of a battleground where the internet’s tech titans and many minor players are waging a protracted campaign about your choice of an internet browser. Unfortunately, you may be an unwilling victim in the war.

An internet browser is the program you use to see websites, visit Facebook, and check your webmail account. You can find out which browser you’re using by visiting What Is My Browser (www.whatismybrowser.com).

In the internet’s early days Netscape was the dominant browser but in Windows 95 Microsoft unveiled Internet Explorer (IE) and the “browser wars” began as IE and Netscape fought for dominance. By the late 1990s IE emerged victorious with about 90 per cent of the world’s computers using it.

However, Netscape was retooled as Firefox by the non-profit Mozilla Foundation. Firefox was superior to Internet Explorer in terms of speed and security. Slowly it overshadowed IE which, beset with security issues and obsolescence, faded.

In 2008 Google launched Chrome and in 2015 Microsoft released Windows 10 with its new browser called Edge.

In the second browser wars Chrome emerged by 2017 as the clear winner with almost 60 per cent of computers using it, far ahead of Firefox with 6 percent and Edge at less than 2 per cent. (http://gs.statcounter.com/ browser-market-share). Safari, which is used on Mac and Apple devices, has 15 percent of the market share.

Why does each of these tech giants desperately want you to use its browser? The answer is money. Whenever you use the search bar in Firefox, Mozilla Foundation gets a royalty from one of several search engines including Google, Yahoo, and Duck Duck Go. Each royalty is only a few cents but in 2016 those pennies added up to more than $500 million U.S. for the foundation.

Google is more guarded about its income sources, but admits that Chrome is a huge moneymaker, and Google doesn’t have to pay search royalties to itself.

Each browser also has a default home page, which is the website displayed when the browser is launched.

Revenue is generated by advertising displayed on the default home page and your browser is capable of tracking your internet activity and displaying targeted advertising.

The pursuit of cash has led to pressure tactics and often downright trickery. Try to install Firefox or Chrome on a Win 10 computer and you’ll see a pop up advising you to re-consider and stay with Edge. Microsoft also made it difficult to set another browser as the default program on a Win 10 computer, although you can manually change the settings. Click the Start button, then the little gear icon to open Settings, choose Apps, and you’ll see the link to change the computer’s default programs.

Many people have complained about installing a piece of software and finding that Google Chrome was installed as well. Fortunately you can have numerous browsers on your system and they won’t conflict with each other, and you can uninstall any browser you don’t want, except Edge.

Changing a browser’s settings stealthily is called a browser hijack and some hijackers such as the notorious Search Conduit, which Microsoft declared to be malware, can even damage the operating system. When you download and install any software be sure to uncheck any boxes that allow changes to be made to your browser or the installation of another browser.

Luckily, The Computer Hope site has an entire library of how to fix or adjust almost anything to do with the most popular browsers (https://www.computerhope.com/browsers.htm), including instructions for re-setting the homepage and search provider if your browser is hijacked.

With some care and knowledge you can make sure you’re not a victim in the latest browser war.

Ray Saitz, a Peterborough resident and teacher, writes a regular column on the Internet. He can be reached at rayser3@cogeco.ca