Microsoft has long been trying to convince users of its Internet explorer 6 to ditch the aging Web browser and switch to a newer one, but the software giant’s kill IE6 campaign is still far from proving desired results.

The newest version of Microsoft’s Web browser, IE9, was rolled out last month. It is claimed to be faster and safer than the previous versions.

The company expects newer version of its web browser to help it get rid of older version, which are not as fast and safe as the newer versions. But, IE6 still accounts for around 11.6 per cent of Internet users around the world, while the company has an aim to bring the figure below 1 per cent.

It will likely take a long time for the company to get rid of IE6 because killing IE6 will cause considerable problems for businesses. IE6 was introduced in 2001, when several businesses wrote internal Web applications, and up to
40 per cent of those applications do not work on IE’s newer versions. Ditching IE6 would force those businesses to write those applications again.

Microsoft’s IE has suffered a fall in its Web browser market share, but it is still the leader in the market with around 56 per cent share. Mozilla Web browser Firefox is second in place with 22 per cent, while Google’s Chrome and Apple’s Safari have 12 per cent and 6.6 per cent market share, respectively.

According to figures released by NetMarketshare, IE6 has more users than IE7.