NSS Labs, which made a report publicly available Tuesday, says IE9’s malware protection includes SmartScreen URL filtering technology, which is also in IE8, as well as SmartScreen Application Reputation. The latter, new in IE9, uses special algorithms in analyzing programs before they are run or saved. The technology then warns the browser user when a malicious program is detected.

What does this all mean? Well, simply put, it means IE9 is one heck of a malware blocker. Ten times more likely to protect from malware than Mozille Firefox, for instance.

As a matter of fact, every browser except for IE has experienced a significant downgrade of security since the last test was performed earlier in the year. Firefox 3.6’s ability to protect fell by 10%, Safari 5 declined by 18%, and Chrome 6 dropped by 14%.