Last month, I asked “How long is too long?” to keep your older technology in service. If the answers there weren’t enough to encourage proactive replacements, now, after a 10+ year run, Windows 7 is finally being sunset by Microsoft. When that occurs in January of 2020, Windows 7 PC’s won’t suddenly stop working. However, Windows 7 users need to be aware of the implications of continuing to use the older operating system.
Sunset, also known as “end of support,” means that Microsoft will no longer produce and provide security updates, bug fixes, or service packs. Without those, the security, and performance of Windows 7 will degrade. Specifically, as time goes on past early 2020, Windows 7 users can expect:
- Software that is being kept current by the developer becoming incompatible with Windows that’s not
- New devices not working with Windows 7 if they don’t include or offer the Windows 7 drivers
- Virus protection and security software vendors will stop supporting Windows 7, though that will take some time
- Software bugs will no longer be patched, leaving Windows 7 systems open to successful attack
- Authentication and encryption that aren’t available in Windows 7 could make banking and secure ecommerce difficult, if not impossible
The most serious issues are those involving security. The bad guys will know that Windows 7 is unpatched and therefore vulnerable. Knowing that, Windows 7 becomes an easy target for malware, ransomware, and viruses. It’s worth noting that there are still millions of Windows XP computers in use, even though XP has been sunset for some time – and some of the most serious, damaging attacks in recent years have been against XP targets. Why? The bad guys know where the holes are, and know they’ll never be patched.
So, if you are running Windows 7 today, today is the time to start planning the move to a new operating system. For most, that will be a move to Windows 10, either by upgrading the Windows on existing computers – or better, replacing the computers with new systems that come with Windows 10 preinstalled.
“How long is too long?” At least for Windows 7 users, the answer is January, 2020.
