The end of Window XP's life could debilitate regulatory compliance standards: The most popular and reigning operating system, Window XP, was released on October 25, 2001 and has been considered the most widely accepted operating system platform across the consumer and business markets is now defunct after April 8, 2014. This means that, as of April 9, 2014, Microsoft will no longer provide support, market or updates, hotfixes, any kind of options support such as Microsoft Security Essentials or online technical content updates. Furthermore, a scenario may arise where a large number of apps and devices do not work well even with Windows XP. Now, this will exponentially increase hacking attacks on machines that continue to use Windows XP. This impending sunset will directly impact corporate environments, door/building security locks, ATMs, government computing devices, e-commerce, military computing devices, POS retail industry and others applications running in that environment and on other organizations that deal with cardholder data and those required to comply with PCI DSS requirements. For retailers the impact may be greater as the PCI Security Standard Council (PCI SSC) does not consider the operating system to be outdated which could cause problems for retailers (using Windows XP) with their banks, regardless of the payment software used. The overarching question here is how this change will affect those who, in particular, upgraded from 2.0 to 3.0 late last year and are required to comply with PCI DSS requirements. The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS), a set of 12 requirements managed by Payment Card Indust...... middle of paper ......ds and also to ensure maximum confidentiality sensitive data and audit reports. References:1. Source: http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/answer/How-Windows-XP-end-of-life-conflicts-with-PCI-DSS-requirement-62?asrc=EM_ERU_26645973&utm_medium=EM&utm_source=ERU&utm_campaign=20140218_ERU%20Transmission% 20per%18/2002/2014%20(UserUniverse:%20672236)[email protected]&src=5213080 2. PCI DSS version 3.0 (PDF)3. Will the end of XP shut down your business or your heart? http://www.infosecisland.com/blogview/23692-Will-the-Demise-of-XP-Shut-Down-Your-Businessor-Heart.html 4. Wikipedia: http ://en.wikipedia.org/wiki /Windows_XP 5. Times of India http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/tech-news/End-of-Windows-XP-Who-all-are-at-risk/articleshow/33431926.cms?utm_source= facebook.com&utm_medium=referral 6. BBChttp https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-26884167