Microsoft announced today that while the end of support for the Windows XP operating system is still scheduled for April 8, 2014, they will extend the antimalware signatures and engine for Windows XP users through July 14, 2015 to allow more time for businesses to make a complete transition. For consumers, this means that your Microsoft Security Essentials will continue to receive updates but the operating system itself will no longer be supported otherwise. This may lead to some misunderstandings regarding security by people thinking they will still be secure, when in fact they will actually be using an unpatched operating system after April 8th which still leaves them vulnerable.

At the end of December 2013, the statistics showed that Windows XP still held an 11.6% trend in the market for operating systems in use, Windows 7 had the lead with 55.9%, and Windows 8 was at 8.2%. Windows 7 showed minimal change from December of 2012 to December of 2013, with just a .3% increase.

This may be of some comfort to the die-hard Windows XP users out there, but for those that refuse to give it up, Microsoft really hopes you’ll change your minds soon.