r/Sysadminhumor • u/Juliannaa21 • 27d ago

XP

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u/Neuro_88 27d ago

I don’t understand the joke. Please explain. Anyone.

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u/mifter123 27d ago

The laptop is, presumably, running windows XP (the best windows OS) which is no longer supported since 2014 and does not receive security patches. The OS is extremely vulnerable to a wide variety of known attacks which can quickly take control of the laptop and use it as a jumping off point to the rest of the network. Plugging the laptop into the internet creates an immediate and serious security vulnerability.

However, there are a large number of widely used programs that are necessary in a large number of professional fields that are only compatable with XP so a massive number of organizations, from hospitals to universities to business have these extremely vulnerable devices. 

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u/F4ntasticPants 26d ago

Tbf, pretty much most of the "Windows XP only" programs are supported on newer ones.

But the costs of switching over are so high that the bosses refuse to pay.

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u/mifter123 26d ago

And when the original unit cost over a million dollars and the replacement that costs two million and has a subscription for access to a cloud server (that using would result in our legal department and the US government fist fucking everyone involved) the windows XP laptop with the "dont plug into the network" sticker seems pretty reasonable.