People all around the globe have been warned of an update of Chrome, Firefox, and Edge that could possibly crash popular websites.
Google, Microsoft, and Mozilla warned users that a unified update will soon be made, resulting in the crash of the world’s most visited websites. The update will impact 4 billion users of Chrome, Firefox, and Edge, according to a report from Forbes.
The move has been linked to the notorious Y2K bug in which the three browsers will move to version no. ‘100′ leaving websites unable to process visits from browsers with three-digit version numbers.
Some of the sites already impacted by the move include T-Mobile, HBO Go, Yahoo, and Bethesda.
When a user visits a website, the site checks the browser version number for security purposes. If the site determines that a browser is unsupported or is an older version, it is likely to not open certain websites due to fear of being compromised. The problem arises as outdated codes of many websites only check the first two digits. Thus, Chrome, Firefox, and Edge 100 will be read as ’10’ and be eventually blocked.
Many websites are moving to version 100 to force web developers to upgrade. Currently, the stable versions of Chrome and Edge are 98 and Firefox is on 97.
To mitigate this issue and as a countermeasure in case websites start failing after the upgrade, Google plans on freezing Chrome’s version number at 99 in its ID code.
Mozilla also wants to take the appropriate action and will reportedly try a combination of version number freezing and issue hotfixes for individual websites. While Microsoft has yet to comment on the matter.