Firefox to US$7,500 cash reward) to researchers who discover severe security holes in Firefox. Official guidelines for handling security vulnerabilities discourage early disclosure of vulnerabilities so as not to give potential attackers an advantage in creating exploits. Because Firefox generally has fewer publicly known security vulnerabilities than Internet Explorer (see "Comparison of web browsers"), improved security is often cited as a reason to switch from Internet Explorer to Firefox. "The Washington Post" reported that exploit code for known critical security vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer was available for 284 days in 2006. In comparison, exploit code for known, critical security vulnerabilities in
Firefox Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), based on data compiled from the National Vulnerability Database (NVD), Firefox was listed as the fifth-most vulnerable desktop software, with Internet Explorer as the eighth, and Google Chrome as the first. InfoWorld has cited security experts saying that, as Firefox becomes more popular, more vulnerabilities will be found, a claim that Mitchell Baker, president of the Mozilla Foundation, has denied. "There is this idea that market share alone will make you have more vulnerabilities. It is not relational at all," she said. In October 2009, Microsoft's security engineers acknowledged that Firefox was vulnerable to