By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter

In an ironic twist, South Korea, the self-touted high-tech nation of the planet, appears to be clinging to decaying Internet technologies.

Internet giant Google is now telling its users to drop Internet Explorer 6 (IE6), the antiquated Microsoft Web browser that debuted in 2001, planning to kill IE6 support on its key products such as YouTube (www.youtube.com) and Gmail e-mail services.

There is a possibility that the move could be followed by other major Web destinations ― Yahoo! (www.yahoo.com) and Facebook (www.facebook.com) among the many Internet companies that are suggesting IE6 users upgrade their browsers.

IE6 has been blamed for stifling innovation, as it doesn't support key Web standards, which makes it difficult for developers to design more sophisticated Web pages that are compatible with other browsers. And its ability to defend against security breaches is also suspect.

``It's not that Google's current services will be immediately inaccessible from IE6, but it could be said that any new service or functions introduced by Google may not work,'' said a Google Korea spokesman.

``IE6 is now a 10-year-old browser and is ill-equipped to support the newest innovations in Web technology, so its users must be advised to upgrade.''

Cutting the cord to IE6 isn't expected to cause too much noise in most countries when it is clearly on its way out, accounting for less than 15 percent of the world's browser market as of January, according to market researcher, StatCounter.

However, there could be disruption in Korea, where about half of the country's computer users still insist that IE6 should be their gateway to the Internet.

In what would be seen as incredible elsewhere, IE6 seems to have actually gained ground here in the past few months ― the browser's share dipped below 40 percent for the first time last September, but has now recovered to a healthy 49 percent.

There has been a campaign among bloggers and developers to reduce the overreliance on IE6, including Victor Ching and Brian Lee of PUMPL (www.pumpl.com) who started an ``IE6 No More'' Web site (www.ie6nomore.co.kr) last year. However, pushing the Korean Internet environment to move on is no easy job.

There is a simple explanation for the Korean reliance on the old system ― most companies here are reluctant to go through the trouble to test and rewrite their in-house computer programs that are entangled with Active-X plug-ins.

``One of my co-workers upgraded his browser to Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) after visiting a foreign Web site that suggested it, but our company's in-house work programs and systems didn't run properly on the new browser. Our IT team guys went around telling everybody to keep the IE6 browsers,'' said Hong, a 29-year-old who works for a trading company in Yangjae-dong, southern Seoul.

Active-X, a Microsoft-developed tool introduced in 1996, is the key reason the U.S. software giant cemented a virtual monopoly in computer operating systems and Web browsers here.

The current law states that all encrypted online communications on computers require the use of electronic signatures based on public-key certificates.

And since the fall of Netscape in the early 2000s, the Active-X controls on the IE browsers remain as the only plug-in tool to download the public-key certificates on computers.

The Korean reliance on Active-X is unique, when security concerns and compatibility issues have stunted its use in other countries. Instead of a security-based model, Active-X relies on signatures to allow users to judge whether to download a control.

This is a risky arrangement, since Active-X controls require full access to the Windows operating system and are often abused by cyber criminals who spread malicious programs to direct the browser to download files that compromise the user's control of the computer.

Even Microsoft seems ready to bail on Active-X, moving to phase out the technology from its newest computer operating systems and Web browsers, which adds to the awkwardness here.

thkim@koreatimes.co.kr