Windows XP lost Microsoft support and updates over a year ago and if you’re currently running that OS you do so at your own risk. When support and updates for an operating system cease, your system will no longer be protected against the latest virus and malware threats. No updates is a big problem and updating to either Windows 7 or 8 is highly recommended, but apparently not for the U.S. Navy. They’re still using Windows XP on their ships out at sea and in service and they’re paying Microsoft $9 million a year to support and update Windows XP for them.

To be fair the Navy says their ships rely on older computers and software that need Windows XP to run, which makes sense. But what doesn’t make sense is the fact that nothing has been updated for this long. Any good IT department knows that a version of an operating system will not go on forever, over time they grow and change just as it should be. Microsoft’s current production software is Windows 8.1 and they will be rolling out Windows 10 soon. The U.S. Navy has had plenty of time to plan for an update to their computers and software systems and it should have been done, at the very least, with Windows 7.

To be fair again, getting anything done in the U.S. Government is like pulling teeth from an angry grizzly bear. I’m sure the Navy has it’s fair share of Washington red tape to cut through in order to get approvals for such a massive upgrade. But now the taxpayers are paying Microsoft big money to support XP for the Navy when the Navy could have invested into upgrading systems years ago. At this point it’s going to be an even more massive task to upgrade all those old systems from XP to a newer more stable version of Windows.

What do you think about the U.S. Navy still using Windows XP? Do you have something to add to our story? Something we might be missing and could explain it better? Let us know in the comments below or on Google+, Facebook and Twitter.