News Post

Unfortunately, when it comes to Windows XP, the party’s over.  Microsoft will officially end support for XP Service Pack 3 and Office 2003 on April 8, 2014.

This operating system has been around for more than 10 years and it has been extremely stable, allowing law firms and other businesses to work without having to spend much time worrying with computer problems – at least not problems caused by the operating system.  But once Microsoft stops supporting and upgrading XP, all of the other software providers who have created programs that run on it will likely stop supporting them, too.

While there is some disagreement among computer security experts about whether we are likely to see the arrival of many new viruses and other zero-day security exploits that hackers have been holding in reserve until after security updates for XP run out, there’s no argument at all that an unsupported operating system is a lot more vulnerable to security breaches.  And if you are considered a “business associate” under HIPPA, you will no longer be considered compliant with HIPPA and HITECH when XP is no longer being supported.

So, if you haven’t yet thought about transitioning away from older computers with Windows XP, here is an interesting article with ideas to get you started.