Microsoft Office 2003 Service Pack 3 Disables Older Files
Microsoft Office 2003 Service Pack 3 Disables Older Files
Hanuary 2, 2008: Service packs are usually joyous affairs as they come bundled with enhancements, fixes and speed upgrades, unfortunately for those installing the latest Office 2003 service pack it also includes the disabling of older file formats.
Slashdot user time961 points out that there is no opt-out option when installing the service pack to avoid this from occurring, alleging that “They did this because the old formats are 'less secure', which actually makes some sense, but only if you got the files from some untrustworthy source.”
The change affects those with Word, Excel, 1-2-3, Quattro, or Corel Draw documents that are from the Word 95 era or earlier. Microsoft have posted their own workaround for the problem which requires a complicated registry editing procedure that is not for the non-technically minded.
While it’s no surprise that changes in the latest service packs have an increased focus on security, particularly with the large number of vulnerabilities being discovered every day, it’s something else entirely if this has motivated the locking out of older-generation files by default thanks to a product update.