The Indian Banks’ Association (IBA) has advissed member-banks to ensure business continuity after Microsoft ends support for its popular Windows XP operating system. Microsoft has announced that it will not offer support services for XP operating system 8 April. The IBA drew the attention of banks to a study by Microsoft, which estimates that over 34,000 branches of public sector banks would become vulnerable following the decision to stop support to Windows XP. The study estimated that there could be a loss worth Rs 1100 crore in terms of business opportunity in a day and a loss of income worth Rs 330 crore over a period of three days (assuming that a major incident may take three days for the systems to come up to normal functioning). IBA felt banks would have taken cognizance of the news item and taken necessary steps to mitigate the risk. Commenting on the deadline for end of support for Windows XP, a Microsoft India official said the firm has been in touch with most of the banks on this issue.
