This end of life has been described as a “perpetual zero-day”, leaving lingering XP users exposed to all manner of dangers, many of which will likely be easy to reverse-engineer from bugs publicised by Microsoft itself after they are spotted and fixed on later Windows versions. Its mainstream support phase ended way back in 2009, and the current extended, patch-only support period is rapidly drawing to a close. Windows XP has now been superseded by three separate, fully-fledged Windows versions (if, that is, one counts the widely despised Vista).
Google’s rationale behind the decision is that some people will find the transition away from XP a difficult process, and that allowing them to ensure their browsers are kept free of vulnerabilities will ease that transition.īut could its decision end up dissuading people from moving away from XP in a prompt and timely manner? Google has pledged to continue supporting its Chrome browser on Windows XP until at least April 2015, a full year after Microsoft officially ends support for the legacy platform in April 2014.
