Microsoft makes Windows 10 antivirus tools available on Windows 7, 8.1

Despite Microsoft planning on killing off support for Windows 7 in the coming years, the company has made Windows 10’s antivirus tools available for previous iterations of Windows.

While the upgrade to Windows 10 was free for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 users, the adoption rate for Windows 10 has been a slow one. Microsoft has attempted to push Windows 7 and 8.1 users to upgrade to Windows 10, but it hasn’t worked.

Microsoft has given up and made Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection (ATP) available to Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 users. This summer, the Windows 10 security feature will downshift and become available to the people who have yet to make the Windows 10 jump.

Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection is a premiere antivirus service from Microsoft, which means that you have to pay for extra protection. That being said, the service offers plenty of malware detection features, overviews and more through the Microsoft cloud services.

Coming in the form of Windows Defender ATP Endpoint Detection & Response (EDR), Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 devices will have their own unified endpoint security platform.

Microsoft hopes this will push system administrators to upgrade to Windows 10 and make use of the expanded Windows Defender systems. Craig Lefferts, partner director of security and enterprise for the Windows and Devices group, wrote in favor of the move from Microsoft.

“Security is the main driver to get current and stay current with Windows 10. It’s great to see Microsoft helping customers better protect our environment with WDATP support for Windows 7 during this transition.”

Microsoft will still sunset support for Windows 7 in January 2020.