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Monday, April 14, 2014

As Windows XP support ends, are 'XPocalypse' reports overblown?

Consumers, businesses and cash machines rely on the operating system. What are the dangers of support ending?
By Charles Arthur Monday 14 April 2014

Microsoft has officially stopped providing support and security updates for XP, its ubiquitous 13-year-old operating system. The "XPocalypse" officially began on Tuesday 8 April when support officially ended, but security companies have repeatedly warned of the inevitability of a zombie army of hacked XP machines that will stalk the internet, dooming us all.


Except that nobody seems particularly worried. The businessman Derek Olsen wasn't even aware that Windows XP had reached the end of its life, and the computers running it at his company, Olsen Environmental in Perth, Australia, still seem fine. "We've got four or five running it, and six or seven PCs running Windows 7," he says. Nor are the ones running XP antiquated: "All our PCs are less than four years old. We grabbed some ahead of them stopping selling models with XP." There are no compatibility issues, he says.

The 18-strong company is typical of hundreds of thousands – perhaps millions – of small businesses around the world. There are an estimated 430m PCs still running some version of Windows XP, first released in 2001, and whose last formal Service Pack 3, released in April 2008, is approaching its sixth birthday.

Read more here --> theguardian.com
Also Read this --> IRS misses Windows XP upgrade deadline, must pay millions to Microsoft for security patches
And this too --> UK government also paying millions to Microsoft for XP support

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