America Online, with the release of the first public test version of Netscape 8, joins the browser war to capture market share from Microsoft’s leading Internet Explorer (IE), as well as Mozilla Foundation’s open source Firefox, on which the new browser is based.Netscape 8 comes with features designed to protect users against online scams and malicious code, and includes an innovation that allows users to display sites using Mozilla’s rendering engine or Internet Explorer for compatibility and security concerns.“The strategy obviously is to provide another option in what is becoming an increasingly competitive browser marketplace and to combine the security and speed of Firefox with the compatibility of IE with the usability that Netscape is known for,” said Andrew Weinstein, a Netscape spokesman. The new browser includes features that are meant to protect users while surfing the Web, IDG News Service reported. For example, the browser adjusts settings based on a list of known malicious Web sites to protect users from phishing scams. Also, trusted Web sites are displayed with fewer restrictions and use the IE rendering engine for maximum compatibility.Netscape 8 is based on Firefox and uses that browser’s Gecko rendering engine by default, but also supports the IE browser engine. Competition over browsers has ramped up in recent months. In response to growing concerns about security vulnerabilities and in response to the growing popularity of Firefox, Microsoft two weeks ago said it would release a beta of a new IE browser during the middle of this year. Previously, the company had said it would not release a new browser until it ships the next version of Windows, code-named Longhorn, in 2006. There has not been a new version of IE in four years, the news service reported. The new IE 7.0 will also address security issues such as phishing, Microsoft said. Phishing scams are a prevalent type of online attack that typically combines spam e-mail messages and fraudulent Web pages that look like legitimate e-commerce sites. The attacks are designed to steal sensitive information such as user names, passwords and credit card numbers.Joe Pescatore, vice president for Internet security with Gartner, said Netscape’s browser adds attractive security features, but has been eclipsed by IE since its heyday as the most popular browser in the mid-1990s. “The problem with it is the name Netscape,” Pescatore said. “The last thing you remember, you were using it and then it disappeared.“It looks there are real security advances, but I just don’t see enterprises migrating to use it,” he said. Web analytics company WebSideStory reported this week that IE usage dropped to 89.85 percent Feb. 18, 2005, compared to 91.80 percent Dec. 3, 2004. In contrast, Firefox usage grew to 5.69 percent from 4.06 percent in the same time period. Non-Firefox Netscape and Mozilla browsers had 2.47 from 2.83 in the same period. The final version of Netscape 8 is expected out in the second quarter and will be backed by some marketing efforts from AOL, sources familiar with the company’s plan have said. Technology Industry