Win XP Users told to Abandon Internet Explorer

Everybody knows that Windows XP support is coming to an end in only 25 days and while people might be thinking that Microsoft is trying to spam them as much as possible with news on the retirement date, security organizations across the world are telling basically the same thing as the Redmond-based giant.

The United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team has itself issued a notice for Windows XP users, telling them that Microsoft would stop providing patches and security updates for their OS version on April 8, but also giving advice regarding their Windows XP machines.

Basically, the US-CERT said almost the same thing as Microsoft did, but with different words: consumers are recommended to stop using Windows XP and move to a newer platform that has what it takes to provide enhanced security and keep data away from hackers.

But what’s more important is that the US-CERT is also telling users who plan to stick to Windows XP after the retirement date to abandon Internet Explorer completely, as this particular browser could increase the risk of getting hacked after April.

Internet Explorer is the browser that gets patches via Windows Update every Patch Tuesday, so without any other fixes released by Microsoft, such an application would also increase the risks of being hacked.

“Users who choose to continue using Windows XP after the end of support may mitigate some risks by using a web browser other than Internet Explorer. The Windows XP versions of some alternative browsers will continue to recieve support temporarily. Users should consult the support pages of their chosen alternative browser for more details,” the US-CERT said in a security advisory (which you can find below just after the jump).

Microsoft has started to show upgrade notifications on Windows XP computers with the help of a patch delivered via Windows Update on March 8, so everyone should be aware that support for XP is coming to an end.

The question, however, is how many of the 29 percent of the desktop users still running XP right now are willing to migrate? Not many, people say, especially because the transition to a newer platform would also involve hardware upgrades, so the costs of such a decision would be fairly big.

Windows 8.1 is Microsoft’s platform of choice for those still on Windows XP, so the company encourages everyone still on the ancient platform to buy new computers running the modern operating system.