Google Announces the Publication of their Browser Security Handbook

Google has announced the publication of their Browser Security Handbook to Google Code.

From the Blog Post announcement:

In hopes of helping to make the Web a safer place, we decided to release our Browser Security Handbook to the general public. This 60-page document provides a comprehensive comparison of a broad set of security features and characteristics in commonly used browsers, along with (hopefully) useful commentary and implementation tips for application developers who need to rely on these mechanisms, as well as engineering teams working on future browser-side security enhancements.

I think this is great. This handbook appears to be loaded with browser specific information as well as security information that pertains to all browser. Right now it covers:

• Internet Explorer 6
• Internet Explorer 7
• Firefox 2
• Firefox 3
• Opera 9
• Safari 3
• And plans to covers Internet Explorer 8 and the Android Embedded browser

Some of the topics it discusses are:

• Basic Web Browser Concepts
• Standard Browser Security Features (Same Origin Policy, Third Party Cookies, Script Defense)
• Experimental and Legacy Security Mechanisms (HTTP Auth, IE Zone Model, IE XSS Filter, Content Security policy)
• And much more

This really looks like a great read and I am looking forward to sitting down and looking through it more thoroughly. I hope I can understand the concepts well enough to blog about any that I feel are important to the work we do.