[Infowarrior] - MS Office Drops Support For Older File Formats

[Richard Forno]

Microsoft Office Drops Support For Older File Formats
By Scott Gilbertson EmailJanuary 02, 2008 | 9:44:23 AM

http://blog.wired.com/monkeybites/2008/01/microsoft-offic.html

You might not have noticed it yet, but the recent service pack 3 release for
Microsoft Office 2003 contains a hidden "feature" ‹ it disables support for
older Microsoft Office formats. If you've got any old Word, Excel, 1-2-3,
Quattro, or Corel Draw documents hanging around your hard drive you'll need
to delve into the Windows Registry to open them.

A note posted to the Microsoft Support Center says that ³by default, these
file formats are blocked because they are less secure,² and goes on to warn
that ³they may pose a risk to you.²

Which files are blocked depends a bit on your environment since network
administrators can add whatever file formats they want to the registry, but
by default it appears most files in formats which existed prior to Office 97
won¹t open.

The particularly annoying part of the change is that there¹s no easy
workaround. To get Office 2003 SP3 to open older files you¹ll need to hack
the Windows registry.

While it¹s easy for the casual user to dismiss this sort of break in
backwards compatibility since it¹s unlikely they have many key documents in
older formats, there¹s some understandably upset folks who have to maintain
legacy documents in large corporate and academic networks. As one commenter
points out in the Slashdot thread, the situation for large customers is
quite complicated:

        * There is no easy way to identify the files that need conversion.
Microsoft gives you no tool or flag to quickly identify old files, which
share the same filename conventions as current files. Except of course to
open them in Office 2K3SP3 and watch them fail.
        * Although bulk conversion tools exist, they cost money and they
won¹t reach files that are secured in such a way that IT support staff can¹t
get at them (e.g., on a CD-ROM in a locked filing cabinet).
        * Because a ridiculously complicated registry hack is required to
enable the converters for the old documents, there¹s no easy way to apply
it, for example as an Active Directory group policy. We¹re left with
error-prone methods like push tools & login scripts.

To add insult to injury, Microsoft's explanation for the changes doesn't
wash ‹ file formats are not insecure and cannot by themselves allow
something like a buffer overflow exploit. The security vulnerability is in
the program that opens the files and allows the exploits to execute. The
issue then is not the older documents but that Microsoft has decided that,
rather than address the insecure code in Office, it will simply disable
support for the formats which could exploit those insecurities.

If you¹re affected by the changes and want to open your documents, have a
look at the registry hack ‹ according to Microsoft it¹s your only option.

Naturally, there¹s an alternative which is somewhat easier (and free): just
grab a copy of OpenOffice which can handle the older file formats. Once
you¹ve got them open, now might be a good time to convert them to ODF
documents lest Office 2017 decide to again disable support for older file
formats.