On April 14 US-CERT (the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team under the Department of Homeland Security)  issued an alert, explaining that Apple is ending it’s support for QuickTime Windows. US-CERT said this will impact anyone with Microsoft Windows who has Apple QuickTime installed. They said that to avoid the security problems which will come with this change, Windows-users should uninstall QuickTime altogether.

US-CERT cited a call to action from Trend Micro, a technology security news organization.

“Everyone should follow Apple’s guidance and uninstall QuickTime for Windows as soon as possible,”  Trend Micro said.

They said that two serious security vulnerabilities have already been found in the QuickTime Windows software, which will be especially problematic now that Apple will stop issuing security updates to the software. Tech Micro said they don’t know of any attacks on these vulnerabilities yet, but they believe it’s important to uninstall QuickTime all the same.

Many computer users just click past security updates as fast as they can. But Jon Benton, owner of Super Geeks computer repair shop in Lubbock believes this is a security update which can’t wait. 
 
“I would rank this as a pretty high [priority], this needs to be something that gets taken care of immediately,” Benton said. He is trying to spread awareness to consumers about why they need to uninstall QuickTime.
 
“That’s the best way to prevent any issues with it, because of the vulnerabilities and Apple says they’re no longer going to push out updates to fix those. The only way to fix that is to remove QuickTime from the computer,” Benton said.
 
He added that Mac users don’t have to worry about uninstalling QuickTime as the security flaw will only impact those with Windows operating systems. 
 
“Right now the risk is very low,” Benton clarified. “There are a couple of vulnerabilities in QuickTime, but there’s been no known cases of people being exploited by that. But as time goes on the risk will exponentially increase, that can be anything from viruses to people actually hacking into the machines.”
 
Benton believes this software flaw will be especially problematic because so many computers have used QuickTime at one point.  
 
“QuickTime usually comes installed on Windows or if you install iTunes to do stuff on your iPpad, QuickTime will come with it even if you don’t use it really.”
 
But Benton said just because QuickTime can be found on many computers doesn’t mean it’s essential.
 
“We don’t notice too many people who actually need it, we were trying to think of the last time we actually needed QuickTime here and we were struggling to find an answer,” Benton said.
 
He is advising his customers who have a Windows platform to uninstall soon.
 
“The big news buzz for it is right now and 6 months down the line everyone will have forgotten about this and QuickTime will still be there, and that’s when the real problems are gonna start.”
 
Benton said there are many other software programs available which can play video as well as– if not better than– QuickTime. For his computers he uses a VLC media player. 
 
For anyone in Lubbock struggling to uninstall Windows, Benton said that he will help anyone do so for free at the Super Geeks shop.