Okay, all you Windows XP users – and, by now, you know who you are. The security threat to your computer could get uncomfortably real next week.
Microsoft is set to release its next series of routine security patches on Tuesday, and for the first time, it won't be releasing any patches for the 13-year-old operating system known as Windows XP, according to veteran security blogger Graham Cluley.
"In all probability," Cluley warned on his blog today, "there will be Windows vulnerabilities fixed on that day which will remain unpatched on the unloved Windows XP platform."
"And it would be no surprise at all if malicious hackers reverse-engineered Microsoft's fixes and explored how to exploit on Windows XP security flaws that are fixed on the likes of Windows 7."
It's not that XP users haven't been warned. As we've reported before, Microsoft has been telling everyone for months that, as of this spring, it would no longer issue security updates for the aging, but still widely used XP version of its flagship Windows operating system – even though XP is still running on tens of millions of personal computers around the world.
But Microsoft backtracked from its self-imposed April 8 deadline, when it responded last week to a new and dangerous vulnerability involving its Internet Explorer web browser. Microsoft distributed a set of software patches to fix that problem on May 1, and it deemed the threat so severe that it decided to include a patch for computers running Explorer on XP.
As a Microsoft security official noted, the company is still encouraging users to upgrade to a newer, more secure operating system. And now Cluley is arguing that it's time for Microsoft to show some tough love. Providing further patches for XP is only encouraging people to put off a needed upgrade, he writes.
"I'm not saying it's going to be pretty," Cluley added, but: "It's time for the world to get rid of Windows XP. And it's time for Microsoft to make an honest clean break and not release any more fixes for XP."
