The source code for Windows XP (and Windows Server 2003) has been leaked and is publicly available for download on 4chan.
Source code is human-readable programming, used for editing. Source code is compiled into the various files found in your Windows directory.
There are a bunch of different dimensions to this:
- Who cares, most of the world stopped using XP years ago.
- Malware creators care: more than 1% of the world’s computers still use XP.
- Hackers may be amused to create their own roll-your-own versions of Windows.
- Much of this is probably still rolled into Windows 10 without much change, potentially creating a whole bunch of avenues for malware.
- On the dark web, some say this code has been out for years, although that’s not been documented.
- Is this a sneaky way for Microsoft to push those last XP users to finally upgrade?
- Ummmm … ATM’s still run on Windows XP
- Are we going to look back on this as the moment when Windows began to shift towards open source?
There are unconfirmed rumors that the source code for Windows 10 has also been liberated. That’s a much bigger problem.
And here’s the tricky part. Remember DOS? Yes, it’s still “part” of Windows 10, but the last operating system “based on” DOS was Windows ME. Windows XP was based on Windows NT, which was a rewrite from the bottom up. In fact XP is the brand name NT 5.1, and Server 2003 is the brand name of NT 5.2 If you’ve ever wondered why they were called Windows 7, 8, and 10 … now you know.
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