Advent tip #10: Don’t put off those updates!

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crime | hacking | security

Lots of us do it.

We know there’s an update available, and we know perfectly well that it serves a vital security purpose…

…so we promise ourselves we’ll install it Really Soon Now, perhaps even tomorrow.

And before we know it, it’s the end of next month, and we’re still putting off the download, or we still haven’t found a convenient time to reboot our laptop, and now we’re two updates behind.

Putting off updates is a bit like noticing that your driving licence just expired and figuring, “It’s only a couple of days over – I’ll stop at the Traffic Department on the way home and renew it.”

You’ll probably get away with it, just like you did last time, but there’s a lot that could go wrong, so you’re not really doing yourself, or anyone else, any favours.

We accept that it’s tempting to wait and see how everyone else gets along with a new update first, instead of being an early adopter.

But if everyone took that approach, we’d all be waiting for everyone else, and the crooks would be rubbing their hands together.

Remember: a brand new security update might cause you a problem, but show-stopping bugs in updates are actually rather rare these days.

On the other hand, an unpatched zero-day security vulnerability will leave your computer open to the crooks, and they will take advantage if they can.

Patch early, patch often!

LEARN MORE

Learn more about patching, and why security updates are important, in this Sophos Techknow podcast.