Microsoft has confirmed some new changes for the Chromium-based Edge browser that it has been working on. One of the biggest additions is an “IE Mode” for Edge which basically means that Microsoft’s legacy Internet Explorer browser would be built into the new Edge. While you may have stopped using Internet Explorer a long time back, the browser is still required by many businesses to load internal sites.
The IE Mode for Edge will enable businesses to load old sites within the new Edge Chromium browser. It will do that by using the Internet Explorer rendering engine. This will eliminate the need for businesses to use Internet Explorer for their old internal sites.
Microsoft’s Joe Belfiore said that the company is going to make this totally seamless, with the IE Mode loading content inside Edge, so much so that users won’t be able to tell the difference if it wasn’t for the small IE logo on the tab which shows that the mode has been enabled.
Belfiore confirms that this mode has been exclusively designed for businesses and that this would give them a big incentive to use the Chromium-based Edge instead of using Chrome and Internet Explorer. We’ve got a browser for you that updates regularly that will go on Windows 7 and the Mac that handles things like IT customization of the New Tab page and Microsoft Search, and IE built-in,” he explains.
The company is also making some privacy improvements which include blocking web trackers that follow users across the web. It also plans to create a single privacy page in the browser which will let users choose from three different levels of privacy: unrestricted, balanced, and strict, with the level of ad tracking varying across each mode.