End of the line, shorty! Windows XP is in its final stretch, with the fan favorite operating system about to receive its final set of security fixes next week as part of the Patch Tuesday cycle on April 8, 2014.
That means only five days remain before end of support for Windows XP, Office 2003 and Windows Server 2003. And by that token Internet Explorer 6 too — as this was the version of the browser that came by default with the classic old operating system.
Obviously, the old OS still commands a user base in the high 20s, and most of them would be rushing to download and deploy the final set of security patches via Windows Update.
Microsoft has put up the advance bulletin, and according to the summary, Windows XP will receive a Critical update for IE6, 7 and 8. Another patch labeled Important is on the cards, too.
Windows Server 2003 also gets the same updates, though the first one only counts as Moderate for the server platform. Office 2003 is also in on the action with two patches, one Critical and one Important.
Several of these updates also carry over to newer versions of these software, including Windows 8 and Windows 8.1. Though it is not yet clear whether Microsoft plans to release a fix for the recently discovered flaw in Word that allows attackers remote code execution via a malicious RTF document.
The company released a Fix-It solution for this bug not too long ago, by the way.
As usual, Microsoft has not provided specifics on the vulnerabilities that are going to be fixed by these new patches, but we should be able to find out right at the start of next week.
