XP support? It’s an open Window
Microsoft keeps planning to shut down support for Windows XP sometime in the next two years. While that date seems open to continual revision, Microsoft-watchers say users will continue to offer tech support for XP.
Last year, the company extended the sales life cycle – the time during which PC manufacturers and system builders could sell computers with XP installed – to June 30, 2008. It will stop selling XP altogether on Jan. 31, 2009.
It then extended the mainstream support period for XP to April 14, 2009, in an effort to reassure customers made nervous by the long delays in shipping Vista.
The result of all this tweaking is that Microsoft will stop selling XP long before it stops supporting it. You may be able to run XP for as long as you want, but before too long you may not be able to buy a legitimate copy of XP.
Facebook users exposed by lapse in security
The Associated Press reported that personal photos posted on Facebook Inc.’s popular online hangout can be viewed by people who shouldn’t see them, despite a newly upgraded set of privacy controls.
The AP verified the loophole after receiving a tip from a Byron Ng, a Vancouver, B.C., computer technician. Ng began looking for security weaknesses last week after Facebook unveiled more ways for 67 million members to restrict access to their personal profiles.
But the added protections weren’t enough to prevent Ng from pulling up the most recent pictures posted by Facebook members and their friends. Facebook spokeswoman Brandee Barker said the Palo Alto-based company fixed the bug within an hour.
“We take privacy very seriously and continue to make enhancements to the site,” she said.
The latest lapse serves as another reminder of the perils of sharing sensitive photos and personal information online, even when Web sites pledge to shield information.
Google Android phone ready to come out this year?
A Google executive may have inadvertently tipped the wireless industry’s hand on the launch time frame for Android phones. Since introducing Android, a mobile-phone operating system, last November, Google has said that Android-loaded phones would be available in the second half of this year. This past week, however, Richard Whitt, Google’s Washington telecom and media counsel, said the phones could be out as soon as summer or fall of this year.
Whitt’s remarks came during a conference call. Other Google executives continue to say the launch schedule is up to Google’s partners.
Android is the centerpiece operating system of an open-source alliance of several companies competing against other mobile platforms, such as MS Mobile and Symbian and systems developed by Apple and Research in Motion, which builds the popular BlackBerry phone.