One month from today, support ends for the Windows XP operating system, and Office 2003.
YOU DO NOT WANT TO BE RUNNING UNSUPPORTED SOFTWARE!!!
This is why…
There are still a lot of people running Windows XP. There are bad people in the world who try to find vulnerabilities in Windows (and Office, and anything else with a decent user base). Those people know that any vulnerability that they find is only useful to them until it is patched. If they keep their newly discovered vulnerability to themselves until after 8th April 2014, it’s not going to be patched, so it will be useful to them forever (until people stop using Windows XP)! Therefore, it’s incredibly likely that people have been stock-piling zero day exploits for months if not years, waiting for this.
So, in case it isn’t clear yet, let me summarise: If you are running Windows XP this time next month, it is likely that very soon, someone with bad intent is going to take control of your computer (unless it is completely isolated from everything else).
The good news is that you have a month to do something about it. The bad news is that, depending on the size of your organisation, that pretty much makes it a DIRE EMERGENCY! Stop reading blogs and do something about it.
These links might help you:
http://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/business/community/hints-and-tips/business-implications-running-windows-xp-office
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/en-gb/xp/default.aspx