Internet Explorer will come with 'off' switch in Windows 7

Microsoft said that a control panel in its next-generation computer operating system will let users shut off Internet Explorer 8 and other built-in programmes.

The news comes less than two months after the European Commission sent Microsoft a Statement of Objections accusing the US software giant of unfairly tying Internet Explorer (IE) to Windows.

"In Windows 7 we are...Giving customers more control, flexibility and choice in managing the features available in this version of Windows," Microsoft documents and printing team group program manager Jack Mayo wrote in an engineering blog post yesterday.

"For any of the features listed you can change the state to enable it or disable it."

Opera Software filed a complaint with the commission in 2007 accusing Microsoft of denying Windows users "a real choice of browser."

Mozilla, maker of the popular Firefox browser, has also objected to the bundling of IE with Windows.

Google came out with its own browser, Chrome, last year and recently weighed in on the commission's complaint against Microsoft, calling the IE dominated browser market "largely uncompetitive."