Microsoft's upcoming mandatory update will disable Flash on Windows 10

Since Flash has not been updated by Adobe since December 2020, users could be exposing their devices and personal data to hackers who could take advantage of unpatched security flaws.

Adobe's outdated Flash Player received its last update in December 2020.  (Adobe)

Adobe's Flash Player was released in 1996 and soon became one of the most popular online technologies. However, the same technology was plagued by security flaws and performance issues and remained a clunky old dinosaur while rivals like HTML5 flourished. Adobe finally announced that it was killing off the Flash Player in December 2020, and modern browsers and operating systems are finally getting rid of the outdated technology.

Microsoft has already taken several steps to remove and uninstall Adobe's Flash Player from the Windows 10 operating system — we had reported in February that the company was issuing an update to (also referred to as the KB4577586 update) which would uninstall the Flash Player on Windows 10 or Windows server. However, that update was an optional one, and users were able to block it from being installed on their computers.

The company is now readying a mandatory update for Windows 10, which will permanently remove the Flash Player from a Windows 10 computer, as spotted by Techradar. Scheduled to arrive in July, the update will be part of that month's mandatory Patch Tuesday update, according to the report. Once downloaded and applied, Windows will not let users re-install the player, nor will it let a user roll back the update to get rid of the patches.

It is important to note that while disabling updates, one of the ways to delay the arrival of important updates is sometimes useful, the risks outweigh the benefits. Since Flash has not been updated by Adobe since December 2020, users could be exposing their devices and personal data to hackers who could take advantage of unpatched security flaws. Users who want to stay safe can install the KB4577586 patch which was issued in February, and install the optional updates coming in June, before they become mandatory the next month, according to the report.