The new-found hole in Internet Explorer has certainly sparked a mainstream media storm. My security-expert colleague, Darien Graham-Smith, has been getting more media exposure than the X-Factor winner over the past couple of days, culminating in an appearance on BBC News last night. Meanwhile, I fielded a last-minute call from that veritable hot-house of technical gossip – the Chris Evans show on Radio 2.

The widespread coverage of the IE flaw will be doing Microsoft no favours at a time when it’s struggling to fend off the emerging Google Chrome and the enduringly popular Firefox. Even worse, the pain was entirely self-inflicted.

News of the hole broke on Microsoft’s own Malware Protection Center blog, and while you have to admire the company’s candour, you can’t help but wonder if the bloggers inadvertently spun the threat for more than it was actually worth. 

“Based on our stats, since the vulnerability has gone public, roughly 0.2% of users worldwide may have been exposed to websites containing exploits of this latest vulnerability,” the post read.

“That percentage may seem low,” they said, building the suspense, “however it still means that a significant number of users have been affected.

“The trend for now is going upwards: we saw an increase of over 50% in the number of reports today compared to yesterday,” they concluded, using the kind of meaningless statistic you normally see bandied about by fledgling internet start-ups, who get their PR agencies to spin an increase from two to three registered users over the past month for all it’s (not) worth.  

Microsoft’s open approach to blogging – pioneered by the now-departed Robert Scoble – has definitely helped give the company a much-needed shot of personality. But that blog post would have been a damned-sight less alarmist had it gone through the company’s legions of press officers first. As I’m pretty sure all future posts from the Malware Protection Center will be…