[German]The German federal government and subordinate authorities will pay approximately 800,00 Euros in 2020 to provide updates to computers running Windows 7 SP1 after the end of support. This was the announcement a few days ago. So today, in the sense of a 'review, let's have a look at that topic.
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The extended support of Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008/R2 by Microsoft ended on 14.1.2020. However, companies and public authorities can book a paid Extended Security Update Program (ESU) and thus receive security updates until 2023. For customers with volume licensing programs and certain subscriptions, the whole thing is even free of charge in the first year – and outside of this bonus program, with 75% of the license costs, it's also good to get it for free. So much for a preliminary remark.
The alleged 'Bill for the taxpayer'
The first message probably came from the Handelsblatt (not linked, because behind a paywall). The content of the article:
An inquiry of the Green party parliamentary group to the Ministry of the Interior has shown that the 'Federal Government' incurs considerable costs because a large number of PCs in the individual federal ministries and downstream authorities still use the outdated Windows 7 operating system.
According to the response of the Ministry of the Interior, at least 33,000 computers still running Windows 7 SP1 will be affected in 2020. Parliamentary State Secretary Günter Krings (CDU) writes in his government response that there is no "central overview" of the changeover from the old to the new system. Five of the 14 federal ministries are not even listed in the list. BND and other departments are also missing. "The authorities and departments are solely responsible for the timely Windows 10 changeover after Windows 7 support has expired".
The press release of the green party and a DPA message led then in the media to headlines, like 'Taxpayer bill of Million Euro for Windows 7 support end'. In englisch media, too, the headline went around how stupid the German government was. I was then asked by my reader of my blogs about details.
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A closer look
The statement about the 'failures that cause IT security risks & additional costs in the millions' in the press is pure rubbish Let's dig a bit deeper.
Windows 10 not GDPR compliant!
On January 3, 2020 I've published the article Windows 10, the telemetry and the GDPR privacy problem… within the blog. The article also discusses the adoption of a review scheme 'Privacy on Windows 10' of November 2019 by the Data Protection Conference. The crux of the matter:
The data protection officers of the federal and state governments see little scope for using Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system in a legally compliant manner.
So if I take this statement seriously, and I do, IT managers actually have no way of switching to Windows 10
ESU costs of 24 Euro per computer and year!
Under this aspect: It is a failure, that German authorities are dependent on Microsoft's Windows and don't let develop an alternative in terms of 'government Linux'. And if we look at the costs of 800.000 Euro for 'at least 33.000 computers, you'll get about 24 Euro per computer and year. With a bit of luck, these 24 Euros will even 'amortize' in the support department, as there is no need to update the clients with the feature updates for Windows 7. This is where the alleged scandal, which the press believes to have recognized, falls apart.
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