Safari Seed Program Halted After Leaks

A seed program for Apple's Safari Web browser has been suspended following numerous widespread leaks to the Internet. Although beta builds of Safari have been publicly released, Apple was also frequently sending developers newer releases containing added features such as tabbed browsing. The most recent leak of beta build 67 prompted Apple to notify members that it was closing the program.

"Due to Safari 67 postings to the internet, we have closed the Safari Seed project," Apple wrote in the e-mail. "We know that the majority of you are not responsible for the leaks to the internet, and we sincerely appreciate your feedback, time and effort with this project."

Many of the private beta builds released through the seed program have ended up online, showcasing progress Apple has made with its new browser. Although tabbed browsing was available in previous leaks through a debug menu, beta build 67 was the first to include a preference for the popular new feature. Build 67 also includes new AutoFill functionality for completing Web forms.

Apple unveiled Safari at Macworld San Francisco in January, with claims the browser is three times faster than Microsoft's Internet Explorer on the Mac OS X platform. Despite the closure of Safari's seed program, Apple will likely continue to release beta builds of Safari as development continues.