You may have heard that Windows XP support is ending in April 2014. There have been warning emails, news articles, blogs – you name it. If you hadn’t heard before, you have now.
What does this mean for you, if you are using Windows XP? And what should you be doing to protect your business? Let’s answer the key questions we’re being asked by our clients.
Microsoft say that Windows XP SP3 and Office 2003 support ends on 8 April 2014. What does this actually mean?
This means that there will be no technical support by Microsoft for the Windows XP operating system and Office 2003 package. They will also stop updating the XP operating system (OS), and Microsoft Security Essentials (Microsoft’s freebie anti-virus software), which will no longer be available for download.
This is not the end of the world if you’re security conscious, however. If you have installed Microsoft Security Essentials before 8 April you will still receive anti-malware support. If a vulnerability within the OS is found though, there will be no way of protecting yourself. This brings me to my next point.
What do you do now?
Essentially you have two choices. Either you stick it out with XP and bolster your security or, you upgrade to Windows 7 or 8 or switch to an Apple Mac.
If you stick it out with XP, there are a couple of things you can do to keep yourself as secure as possible;
1) Invest in Symantec Hosted Endpoint Protection from £2 per pc per month. TechRelate can get you started on a free one month trial and help you protect your computers
2) Talk to TechRelate about implementing web filtering policies to block malicious traffic at the perimeter. This can also control what is visible and how your users access the internet.
I’m not going to go into more detail here as that would take a long, detailed article.
What I can tell you, in a nutshell, is that Windows XP will never be completely secure ever again.
If you decide to go with the safer option and improve your security, but you can’t bear the thought of moving away from Microsoft Windows, you could go with Windows 7 or Windows 8.1. Each OS has its pros and cons. In brief, we can break it down like this. If you go with Windows 7, you will most likely be able to keep your current hardware and just buy the operating system. If you want new hardware, it will most likely be pre-installed with Windows 8 or 8.1.
In Summary
When you leave the office on 8 April 2014, it will be the last day you’re running supported Windows XP. But guess what? Nothing will look different when you walk in on 9 April but over time there will be application and security challenges that you will have to overcome.
Edit: Important Update (09/05/2014)
The first official major security flaw which will not be patched by Microsoft has officially occurred. There is a flaw which is affecting versions 6 through 11 of Internet Explorer, the flaw allows hackers to have the same access on a network computer as the official user. This is a pretty big problem to have, Karl Sigler, who is the threat intelligence manager at Trustwave has said that “…If you haven’t upgraded yet, it’s a good time now.”
Microsoft will issue 8 bulletins in the next week’s batch of security updates for supported operating systems, I won’t bore you with the details but for Microsoft to release this many it shows us it’s a pretty big deal. If ever there was a time to upgrade from XP, now is that time.
Please feel free to contact us on 033 001 002 01 if you have any further questions, if you are still running XP please speak to us and we will give you the best possible solution to your individual situation.
<a href=”https://twitter.com/TechRelate” class=”twitter-follow-button” data-show-count=”false”>Follow @TechRelate</a>
<script>!function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)?’http’:’https’;if(!d.getElementById(id)){js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src=p+’://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js’;fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}}(document, ‘script’, ‘twitter-wjs’);</script>