Internet Explorer 8, with the help of its SmartScreen Filter, has "blocked 1 billion attempts to download malware," Microsoft product manager James Pratt said in a blog post Friday.

The SmartScreen Filter evaluates URLs and their associated servers. If the software recognizes a server as containing malicious content, it displays a warning, saying it's unsafe to browse to a respective site that could cause harm on the user's computer. The user is then given the option to continue to the page or go back to their home page without downloading any content.

According to Microsoft, the SmartScreen filter continues to improve. In August 2009, it blocked 70 million malware download attempts. At the time, just 15 percent of Web users were surfing with Internet Explorer 8. Today, Microsoft reported, nearly 26 percent of the Web population is using IE8, and the company's SmartScreen filter is blocking "five times more malware month on month" compared to August 2009.

Of course, whether Microsoft's ability to block a billion malware download attempts is really something to gloat about is up for debate. On one hand, the company seems to be doing a better job of keeping users safe. On the other, the fact that that many attempts have been made might speak to security issues that still plague the Windows ecosystem. Regardless, it seems that Microsoft is turning its blocking abilities into a positive thing. And to some extent, it's commendable.

But that won't stop me from choosing Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox over Internet Explorer.

Originally posted at The Digital Home

Yoono makes the task of managing multiple different social-networking accounts less of a headache. Using several instant-messaging programs because your coworkers like Google Talk whereas your friends use AIM can also mix you up.

Like Digsby and VoxOx, Yoono combines social networking with instant messaging. Sure, there are social site applications like TweetDeck that let you follow your friend's Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace accounts--not to mention the numerous all-in-one chat clients such as Trillian and Pidgin, which are very popular around the CNET offices. Yoono, however, combines all of these functions into one sleek desktop app. Those who do not want the added desktop clutter can go for the Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, or Internet Explorer add-on version, but these have some issues of their own.

With Yoono's desktop application, users can manage their Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, LinkedIn, and FriendFeed accounts simultaneously. While you interact with these sites, you can also chat on AIM, Google Talk, Yahoo Messenger, and Live messenger all from one spot. This program is intuitive and organized with columns that can be customized with each of your social accounts. My favorite feature is the ability to coordinate people into separate groups. This way, when my actual friends update their stuff, I can see it right away without getting lost in the crowd of high school people and "that one guy from that one Halloween party two years ago...I think". The program has other nifty features like the ability to update all of your social accounts simultaneously and switch between its column view and browser mode.

Though the Firefox add-on has some added widgets to the desktop model, they definitely need improvement. These six widgets are music, Web notes, news, discovery, and shopping. The first three are useful; the music widget plays Last.fm radio, Web notes allows you to save information from the Web, and the news widget streams your Google Reader or Digg feeds in the Yoono side bar. However, the discovery and shopping widgets are pretty annoying. These are supposed to pull up links relevant to what you are browsing at the moment. The attempts are failed; it is as though they pick up random words and display the results.

Yoono for Chrome does not have these added widgets. It has all of the same functions as the Firefox version, like the option to change background color and a sharing feature where you can share an entire page or just a highlighted portion with your online buddies. It also gives you the option to choose a tabbed interface like the Firefox version, or a floating interface that rests next to your Web browser instead of inside of it. Note that when you click on a link (such as a friend's Facebook page) it will open in a new tab anyway. Other than these features, the add-on for both Firefox and Chrome is identical to the desktop application. The Internet Explorer add-on is essentially the same as the Chrome version. It does not have the option of changing the background color and it loads much slower.

Whether you want a separate application or a Web add-on is a matter of personal taste. With the number of tabs I have constantly piling up in my browser, I prefer having a separate program to deal with the social Web and instant messaging. If Yoono improves the functionality of its Widgets, however, I might be tempted to switch. For now, though, I will be Tweeting/Facebooking/chatting/Flickring from my Yoono desktop.

Mozilla's head of user experience for its Labs unit, Aza Raskin, on Friday unveiled a new project called "Tab Candy" that promises to dramatically change the way users manage open browser tabs.

Tab Candy is not an extension, but a new feature that Raskin and team plan to build into a future version of the Firefox browser. In essence, it creates a desktop-like workspace for users to separate and organize open tabs into groups. When opened, these groups act like their own instance of the browser. So, say you had grouped together 5 of 50 open tabs, then opened that group through Tab Candy; you'd only see those 5 in your browser, and not the other 45. You could then jump back and forth between the main grouping and other subgroups--all without having to keep open (or track of) various Firefox windows.

Raskin is keen to note that this level of organization makes it much easier to manage open tabs on devices with smaller screen like Netbooks. The same concept could also be applied to Mozilla's mobile browser efforts, where screen real estate is hard to find.

The concept is still in development, and only available in an experimental version of Firefox, which Raskin has made available for brave alpha testers. Right now it's only feature is this tab organization, though many more features are coming, including search, clusters that can be set as a private browsing session, and public and private sharing of tab groups. Beyond that, Raskin envisions blending in Firefox's extensions functionality to add extra utility to Tab Candy's tab clusters, as well as implementing a memory saving feature that will put long unused tabs into hibernation so they don't suck up memory. Raskin details some of these concepts in the below demo video:

An Introduction to Firefox's Tab Candy from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

Originally posted at Web Crawler

As most people in the known universe are aware, Apple recently announced plans to give a free case to any iPhone 4 user who requests one (and to refund the purchase price to those who already bought one--a process that is apparently now under way).

What we didn't know until today was how Apple planned to handle the giveaway. Would you have to fight traffic on a special Web page? Bring your iPhone to an Apple Store? Chant "antennagate" 10 times while standing inside a pentagram?

Turns out Apple went the app route: the iPhone 4 Case Program lets you choose and order your freebie right on your iPhone 4. Neat.

All you do is run the app, sign in with your iTunes account, choose from the available Bumpers and cases, then enter your shipping address. Plan on waiting 3-5 weeks for your case to arrive (not so neat).

A couple of important notes: if you bought your iPhone 4 prior to today (July 23), you have until August 22 to claim your freebie. Buy it from today onward and you have 30 days. The program ends September 30.

What do you think? Was Apple smart to take the app approach? Would you have preferred being able to walk into an Apple Store and walk out with your Bumper?

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

What's better: short trains that leave frequently or longer trains that leave less often?

Given Google programmers' philosophy of releasing products early then iterating often, it's no surprise that higher frequency is their preference: thus the announcement Thursday that Google will speed up the release cycle of its Chrome browser.

New stable versions of Chrome today arrive about every three months, but Google wants to double that pace, said Chrome Program Manager Anthony LaForge.

"Under the old model, when we faced a deadline with an incomplete feature, we had three options, all undesirable: (1) Engineers had to rush or work overtime to complete the feature by the deadline, (2) We delayed the release to complete that feature (which affected other unrelated features), or (3) The feature was disabled and had to wait approximately 3 months for the next release. With the new schedule, if a given feature is not complete, it will simply ride on the the next release train when it's ready," he said in the blog.

That could mean, for example that some features such as print preview that Google punted from Chrome 6 to Chrome 7 could arrive in mainstream Chrome users' hands earlier.

Browser rival Mozilla is working on the same idea of more frequent releases. As with Chrome, though, it doesn't mean the pace of advancement doubles, only that new features arrive in smaller doses but more often.

For decades, distribution was a difficult matter for the software industry. AT&T and UC Berkeley Unix programmers mailed tapes to one another. And when personal computers caught on, floppy disks and later CDs also relied on the postal service. Software that dates from this era--Microsoft Office, Adobe Photoshop, Civilization--tends toward major updates released years apart.

Google, of course, grew up in the Internet era, when the network could be used to send software. Google likes its software to be updated silently, behind the scenes, and with no user intervention--in short, the way Google updates its search engine algorithm.

Of course, there's still a lot of overhead in releasing software, even as an online update. New versions must be debugged, tested, packaged up, and sent over the wire. It's often easier to handle one bigger train than two small ones. But Google believes its new release process, to be implemented in coming months, will also make project management easier in many ways.

It remains to be seen how amenable Google's philosophy will be to IT organizations accustomed to testing software and controlling its release. Certainly many employees rely constantly on Google's ever-changing search engine, which corporate IT doesn't get to test. But software that runs on a company's computers brings security risks and compatibility challenges not present when visiting a Web site.

Realistically, a release cycle of six weeks rather than three months won't make too much difference to corporate IT geared for cycles many times that duration, so Google's move to turn the crank faster probably won't change things much.

A broader issue also is involved: how fast can people keep up? User interface changes can leave people clicking around in menus and dialog boxes for commands they once knew how to find.

As Chrome spreads beyond the early-adopter crowd, change gets harder. But that might not sound as much at odds with a faster release cycle as one might think. Many Chrome changes are under the hood, such as improvements to JavaScript processing speed, and many others enable Web programmers to exercise new options.

In other words, Chrome is a window on the Web, and it will often be up to Web site owners to worry about making sure people don't suffer future shock.

Originally posted at Deep Tech

Editors' note: Each day for the past 10 business days, CNET personalities you know and love have published slideshows of their 10 personal favorite iPhone apps. Today marks the tenth and final of these posts. Next week, we'll collect the full list of 100 apps and announce the 10 that you, our readers, love the most.

You want an Apple expert's 10 iPhone app picks? You get an Apple expert's 10 app picks. CNET TV Editor Brian Tong, host of CNET's Apple Byte show, turns up everywhere, from radio, to television to CNET's own podcasts.

But did you know that deep below his bleached, urban exterior, Brian Tong is a redneck at heart? You'll have to see his slideshow to believe it, but apparently, only Big Buck Hunter Pro takes Mr. Tong to his "happy place." Is there a softer side of Brian? Sure. From photography apps to a thrifty bar code scanner, his recommendations are handy and hip.

Once you've seen all of Brian's picks, return to this poll to let us know which app is your favorite, then check back Monday on iPhone Atlas to see our roundup of all CNET 100 iPhone apps.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas