While most consumers knock on vendor doors to raise awareness and demand better security, PayPal is flexing their muscle in a different way. They are going to force their users to only use approved web browsers. While this may seem disruptive, it is actually a rather old technique used by software vendors. Every piece of software you buy today, consumer or enterprise, comes with a list of approved and required components. If the user chooses to use a non-approved configuration, the vendor denies support. This is a natural progression of the Internet. Providers of services need not only protect their bottom line by making such demands, but also in the long run will protect the consumer. That is exactly what PayPal is doing and this is good business for everyone.

The next disruptive technology to hit consumers and enterprises will be the single site browser. This will be web browser-like client software that can do nothing but be used for a single website. Think of this as traditional client/server application. If you need to use your financial system, you launch browser X; then if you need to use the ERP system, the user launches browser Y. At the outside of the spectrum, this feels like a 10-year step backwards in user productivity and IT operations management. In all likelihood though, what we will probably see is still a single browser, but one that is intelligent enough to lock all network traffic to single known and trusted site. In this scenario, the user would need to logoff and switch context between system X and system Y; all the while the browser ensures no errant information gets transmitted to any other system.

Can it be pulled off? Given the very open nature of the Internet and HTTP, it's rather easy to impersonate web traffic to look as if the user is using Internet Explorer instead of Firefox. Exactly how and if service providers act on this initiative will be interesting to watch. We do already have one other service for comparison. iTunes from Apple is essentially the same situation. If a user wants to use the iTunes music store, they need to use iTunes. So far, that limitation hasn't seemed to limit Apple's revenues.

So what about the openness of the Internet? What about the market created by browser wars? Are we going to see fewer browsers? Look at this way, the more we demand features and functionality, the more the market will evolve.