So, you may have seen a flurry of posts and articles warning you of the fact Windows 7 has come to its end. It is no longer being supported by Microsoft. What does this mean for you?
Don’t panic, your PC isn’t going to shut down or explode or anything. End-Of-Life (EOL) just means that the manufacturer will no longer be pushing out updates and security patches for this product (Yes, those same annoying updates that take forever and randomly install at the most inconvenient of times).
“Yay!” you may be thinking, “no more annoying updates, phew.” Be warned though reader, this comes with many dark consequences.
Without those updates, without those ever so important security patches, Windows 7 will be vulnerable. Soon there will be a rising amount of easy to use exploits developed to attack Windows 7 machines and because Microsoft won’t be releasing patches, they will work on every single Windows 7 device.
The “too long, didn’t read” of all this is you need to do two things:
- Remove all sensitive data from Windows 7 machines and move them to a secure machine (updated, patched and still supported).
- Decommission the Windows 7 machine or upgrade to Windows 10. There are many ways to do this so if you’re unsure please do get in touch.
For businesses this may be a tricky job, you may have hundreds of users on Windows 7 and don’t know where to start. This is where we, or a similar service provider come into play.
We can upgrade all machines out of hours and re-install the business-critical apps needed for everyday operations. This is a much cleaner and pain-free solution compared to trying to walk everyone through the upgrade individually.
IF you decide all this is too much hassle and “everything is still working so it’s fine” then be prepared to be targeted by hackers and other nefarious individuals that want your data and now have an easy way to get it.
Don’t leave it too late, get in touch, keep yourself safe and have a lovely week!