[CCoE Notice] Windows XP at home

[Luong, Kiet A]

Good morning,

Below is the advisory from UIT security regarding UH campus Windows XP computers, but can be applied to Windows XP computers at home or elsewhere.  If you connect to your office computers from a Windows XP home computer, the security risk is still there since password viruses and Trojans can steal passwords used on compromised Windows XP computers.

Please email if you have any questions regarding Windows XP upgrades.  Thank you for all your efforts to help us with this task.

"As you are all very aware, Microsoft is ending support for Windows XP on Tuesday, April 8th.  We appreciate all of the great efforts everyone has made to upgrade these machines.  However, we are aware that there are a few areas on campus with XP workstations that will not be able to be upgraded before Tuesday.  The following actions must be taken for any remaining UH XP machines:

1.            Install the final Windows XP update so the machine is as protected from the latest vulnerabilities as possible.
2.            Fully patch Microsoft Office (if it is installed) to reduce the chances of it compromising the machine.
3.            Install an alternative browser to Internet Explorer and set it as the default browser. Disable IE.   XP does not support IE 10 or 11, which have better security than IE 9.
4.            Consider disabling or uninstalling browser plug-ins for third-party software and set the browser to ask what to do with PDFs, etc. rather than opening them by default.
5.            Uninstall unused third-party software.  Fully update any software you cannot uninstall.
6.            Enable the Windows Firewall.
7.            Upgrade the anti-virus software to the latest version and the latest definitions.
8.            If possible, remove the workstation from the UH network. Disable the network interface in the device manager to avoid accidental reconnections."

Kiet Luong
Director of Engineering Computing
College Information Security Officer
Cullen College of Engineering
University of Houston
Email: KietL at uh.edu
Voice: 713.743.9974

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