[feelix]

From the article:

>A month prior, on March 14, Microsoft had released a security update to patch this vulnerability and protect our customers. While this protected newer Windows systems and computers that had enabled Windows Update to apply this latest update, many computers remained unpatched globally.

They stopped supporting Windows XP years ago, including with security updates.

There are still around 100 million computers around the world running XP.

It seems irresponsible to just leave them to hang out to dry when there are that many machines out there running it. A virus seems inevitable if they do. And shifting the blame onto the customers is not reasonable when there are still 100 million customers who are "doing it wrong" by not upgrading to a later version of Windows.

This entire article pertains to directly shifting the blame onto their customers, and the governments of the affected countries (!)

>The fact that so many computers remained vulnerable two months after the release of a patch illustrates this aspect

Again, XP systems are the most affected, and there was no patch released for XP. This is extremely irresponsible of Microsoft and this article shifting the blame onto everyone but themselves is reprehensible.

[detaro]

I'm generally much in favor of holding vendors accountable when they abandon users, but Microsoft always had clearly communicated timelines for support, and in the case of XP even extended them later (due to Vista being crap). Windows 7 was out for 5 years or so when XP supported ended, as everyone knew beforehand. It's known you wont get support, it's known Windows XP is going to have security issues, what do you expect to happen when you don't take appropriate measures?(options include: replacing it, increased network isolation, virtualization, ..., depending on why you're still running it. Even just a really good backup strategy makes a difference right now).

Customers like this is why we now have Windows 10 where you're force-fed updates and the OS will change under you instead of the change being an upgrade to a new major version that you can delay for years. (Which I'm not happy about, but I can see its benefits on that scale)

The best argument for Microsoft doing wrong here might be that they limit their (expensive) super-extended support to large organizations. Since they do the work, keeping a few boxes with special hardware patched should be an option for smaller shops as well (and is IMHO easier to defend than keeping a large network full of XP desktops running because ?)

[will4274]

How long should Microsoft be required to support XP? They extended the original support period TWICE. Why are customers entitled to support when they were informed prior to purchasing the product that support expired on a given date?

[codedokode]

Maybe newer OS do not have any useful features for those customers? Maybe they are even worse for them because work slower, are not compatible with old drivers, contain spyware (telemetry)?

[will4274]

Is a company obligated to sell a product with features that you consider useful? Intel doesn't make pre-ME CPUs anymore. Apple doesn't make Power PC iMacs anymore. And Microsoft doesn't make Windows XP anymore. In all these markets, there are consumers who would prefer to purchase the discontinued product. So what? Products get discontinued.

Consider a discontinued product from another industry, like a car or an appliance. When the product is discontinued, the manufacturer only creates replacement parts for existing machines for a limited time period. After some years, it's difficult for a consumer to maintain their copy of the discontinued product because it is difficult to find replacement parts.

The point is, mass produced engineering products have lifecycles. Microsoft clearly defined (and extended) Windows XPs lifecycle and provided patches for the entirety of that lifecycle. It's hard for me to understand how that doesn't fully meet their obligations to be fair to their customers.

[codedokode]

While you are right, there is a difference that you can drive a 20-30-year old (if repaired) car on modern roads but you once you connect a PC with 20-year old OS to the internet, it will get infected. And 20-year old browser will not be able to display modern websites.

Maybe when cars will become more computerized(?) and connected, they will become unusable faster.

[idlewords]

They do support XP, they just charge a king's ransom for it. Thanks to Microsoft's policies, XP is also a kind of ransomware.

[feelix]

While there are more than 100 million users of it they should continue to supply security updates for it. Otherwise a widespread virus like this is 100% inevitable.

[bbatha]

They didn't leave Xp users out to dry. Remember those forced free windows 10 updates they pushed out?

The xp support schedule was available from day one. These companies knew exactly what they were getting into. Microsoft even extended the support period for xp on several occasions. It's galling that we as software professionals see this as malfeasance by the entities running xp still. They've had close to a decade to upgrade. Software is not a durable asset, it comes with an expiration date on the box.

This isn't just about security patches there are pieces of xp that fundamentally insecure, which is partially Microsoft's fault, but on the other hand the driver model which is one of the weakest parts of xp is the thing that kept many of these companies from upgrading.

[boznz]

I dont really have any opinion here but as a correction the "forced free windows 10 updates" only included Windows 8 and 8.1 not vista and XP.