Gotta take issue on this one. Look at any of the archives of the major
security providers. Bugs in IE are found on a daily basis, and
Microsoft has reached a point where they won't even fix some of them
-- even critical ones.
IE and OE may well be the most insecure programs in existence. If
someone held a gun to my head and said that I could only do one single
thing to secure my system, I'd probably pick dumping IE/OE over
anything else, perhaps even using a firewall.
You're right that properly locking down IE and OE makes them safER.
But there is little defense against the exploits besides dumping IE
entirely. To say nothing of the fact that many malicious and
privacy-invading scripts are geared solely at IE users. Why try to
patch leaks in a boat riddled with holes when you can have a new boat
that was designed right in the first place?

>See Eric's vast information about security and privacy. I use
IE-SPYAD.
>http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~ehowes/main-nf.htm <== main site
>http://www.staff.uiuc.edu/~ehowes/btw/ie/ie-opts.htm <== IE security

Again, if you understand how Internet Explorer works, IE-Spyad is a
joke. If you follow Eric's own advice and properly secure your
Internet Zone, you don't need IE-Spyad in the first place, since
ActiveX and VBScripting will be disabled. If you have sites you want
to be able to visit and use ActiveX, place them in your trusted zone.
If you want to be able to visit sites and not have them drop ActiveX
or VBScripts on you, then you don't need to futz with the Restricted
Zone because you'll already have ActiveX downloads turned off. And,
that way, if you come across a site that's not on IE-Spyad's lists,
you'll still be protected.
The flaws are a different story. No security setting you can control
will protect you against all of those exploits. Many can be stopped by
disabling JavaScript (Active Scripting). Of course, half the web will
be unavailable to you if you do that, but that's about the only way IE
can be used SOMEWHAT safely. Some can be prevented by disabling other
features. Some can't be prevented at all, aside from patching or using
another browser.

P.S. Sorry, I'm not bustin' your balls. Just pointing things out.

Sponge
Sponge's Anti-Spyware Source
www.geocities.com/yosponge