Farewell Windows XP

Just to reminded everyone, as from yesterday Microsoft stopped providing free support for Windows XP.

Here is what I wrote about it in February:

"HMRC has 85,784 PCs, of which 85,268 are moving off Windows XP and 58,631 are ditching Internet Explorer 6.

 

As from 8th April this will present a security weakness, as Microsoft will stop offering free support for XP and will no longer provide any protection to block malicious codes and potential hacks that steal users' data. As from then Microsoft will charge an outlandish £122 per desktop for year one, £244 for year two and £490 for year three.
Suffice to say HMRC will not be paying for this service.
However, not to worry, an HMRC spokesperson is quoted by the Guardian:

"HMRC takes security extremely seriously and has many controls in place to guard against online threats. HMRC is already upgrading our IT software and our systems will remain secure whilst this is happening." 

No problem then, except for the fact that the upgrade from XP and Windows 6 won't be completed by April!"

As a loyal reader reminded us yesterday:

"Don't forget the vast majority of us working in HMRC are still running windows xp (no longer supported by Microsoft) and using ie6 as a browser!"

I dare say in the months to come, this security weakness will be fixed!

Tax does have to be taxing.

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