In connection with one of its largest Patch Tuesday releases to date, Microsoft is revealing that some users may be left out of getting a vulnerability fix: Specifically, users of the aging Office XP productivity suite.
That’s because issuing a patch for the decade-old product — which remains officially covered under Microsoft’s extended technical support — would require too much effort, according to the company. eSecurity Planet takes a look.
Almost hidden in the notes to this week’s massive “Patch Tuesday” security fix drop was a notice that one bug in Office XP won’t be patched because it would require a lot of re-architecting that’s just not feasible.
Office XP, which originally shipped in 2001, is still officially covered under “extended” technical support, and that coverage doesn’t end until July 12, 2011, according to Microsoft’s support lifecycle document.