Tomorrow is May update day for Microsoft, as it will release Patch Tuesday. The updates come to fix critical security vulnerabilities in the company's operating system and applications. Windows XP, however, will not be included in the operating systems that Microsoft will update, since it stopped supporting it on April 8.
The problem is that some of the vulnerabilities that the company will patch tomorrow also exist in Windows XP, and one security expert warns that hackers could exploit these weaknesses.
Remember that Windows XP is still installed on 26% of desktops worldwide.
"On Patch Tuesday, Microsoft will patch some Windows vulnerabilities, and it is realistic to assume that at least one of them will affect Windows XP. This means that we can expect to see exploits for XP vulnerabilities because their users will not receive patches from Microsoft," said Kasper Lindgaard, director of Research and Security at Secunia.
"In general, the vulnerabilities recently discovered in Windows XP will remain unpatchable and as a result, we will see an increase in attacks targeting that operating system," Lindgaard continued.
Upgrading to a newer version of the operating system is essentially the only way to ensure that your computer is not exposed to such attacks, and Microsoft clearly recommends that everyone running XP upgrade to newer platforms as soon as possible.
Source: secnews.gr
