Security researcher Charlie Miller, who last year won $10,000 for hacking into a MacBook Air via Safari in just two minutes, says he thinks Safari will be the first browser to fall at this year's Pwn2Own contest. "It might be because I'm biased about the things I'm good at, but it's the easiest browser [to hack]," Miller told Computerworld this week.

The Pwn2Own contest this year will pit hackers against a MacBook running Mac OS X with Safari and Firefox installed, as well as a Sony Vaio P running Windows 7 and IE8, Firefox, and Chrome installed. The browsers are intended to be the target vector to launch exploit code that will "pwn" the machines and earn $5,000 for each browser that is exploited.

"Apple's products are really friendly to users, and Safari is designed to handle anything, including all kinds of file formats," said Miller. "With a lot of functionality comes the increased chance of bugs. The more complex software is, the less secure it is."

Miller believes that the other browsers won't be hacked, based on his experience. "They make it so hard that, for me, $5,000 isn't motivation enough to try to break one of those guys," he said. We doubt that five grand is so unappealing to others that are more familiar with those browsers, but if Miller's prediction proves true, I can only hope Apple has plans to strengthen security in Snow Leopard.

Miller also plans to attempt to hack into the mobile platforms, which are also offered as bait to hackers at this year's contest—and offering a sweeter pot of $10,000 each. He didn't specify if he was going after the iPhone specifically, but he was one of the first to discover a vulnerability in Mobile Safari shortly after the iPhone was launched in 2007.