While doing some research for a different article, I noticed a subtle change to the language that Amazon uses on the Kindle security updates page, so I checked the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine and confirmed that Amazon did indeed change things to their benefit at some point.
First off, Amazon used to say that security updates for Kindles were “guaranteed” for a certain length of time. They no longer say that security updates are guaranteed.
Secondly, they sneakily changed the length of the agreement by altering the language used to define the date of purchase.
Here’s what the Kindle Security Updates page used to say:
The security of your device is a top priority. Your Kindle E-reader receives guaranteed software security updates until at least four years after the device is last available for purchase on our websites. After that time, we strive to provide software security updates for as long as we can (subject to technical and other limitations).
Here’s what the Kindle Security Updates page says now:
We’ll support your device with software security updates until at least four years from when you bought it new, from Amazon as the seller, on Amazon.com (or until the date stated below if later). If you got your device somewhere else, we’ll support it with software security updates until at least the date stated below.
It’s funny how they completely edited out the part about security being a top priority. What’s not funny is how they changed the date of support (after the fact, in some cases) from when Amazon stopped selling the device new to when you first purchased the device. Those two dates can vary by 3 years or more.
The thing is, they still aren’t honoring what they say on that page as it’s written now. It says, “or until the date stated below if later.” The Kindle Oasis appears on the list, and it shows a date of 31 December, 2028. But when I go to the Manage Your Devices page at Amazon and click on the page for my Kindle Oasis it says the following—Software security updates: No longer guaranteed.
According to the old terms, the Kindle Oasis 3 should’ve been getting security updates until 2028 since Amazon was still selling it new until early 2024. Actually Amazon is still selling the international version of the Kindle Oasis new right now, but I guess that doesn’t count for some reason.
Either way, the new edited page says the Oasis will get security updates through 2028, but it hasn’t received any updates in over a year, so something doesn’t add up even with the change to the language.
The 10th gen Kindle is another example of this. The security updates page says it’ll get security updates through December 2026, but on the device summary page my 10th gen Kindle says it no longer gets security updates.
It’s unclear when Amazon changed the terms because most of the archived pages from the Wayback Machine just show a page loading error so I had to go back to December 2023 to find a copy of the old page, which shows the Oasis and 10th gen Kindles getting guaranteed updates through 2026.
The main takeaway is security updates are no longer “guaranteed” on Kindles, and apparently Amazon can change the terms anytime they feel like it without any notification whatsoever so that doesn’t really mean much anyway, and the dates shown are already bogus based on the 10th gen models showing they’re no longer getting security updates on the MYD page. It’s like someone figured out they could renege on security updates for most 10th gen Kindles if they changed it to date purchased instead on when Amazon stopped selling them, but then they forgot to change the dates on the table.
What on a Kindle needs the newest security updates? Software updates I get why you might want the newest version.
Yes; a list of actual security updates would be great. Amazon doesn’t seem to provide a list of historical security updates (nor software updates). I can’t recall any real, recent security updates.
More broadly, I can’t think of any real security issues other than malicious books/content in books and intercepting legitimate updates to provide malicious software. The latter would probably have been exploited by now and would have been in the news. The former was reported late last year, https://www.forbes.com/sites/daveywinder/2025/12/16/critical-amazon-kindle-hack-confirmed—what-you-need-to-know/ but I don’t recall seeing any Kindle update claiming to fix it.
Indeed, I would have liked to avoid the recent updates to my Paperwhite 2 and Oasis 2 which makes DRM removal more difficult.
With that said, there was a small. update on my Kindle 2 days ago. 5.19.4.0.1 , only available for the latest Kindles.
I’m a little confused. Let’s say you purchased a Kindle Paperwhite 12th Gen from Best Buy. Did you just shorten your ability to receive updates? Are you being punished for not buying directly from Amazon?
No, they aren’t going to limit software updates based on where a Kindle is purchased. If a specific model has an update available all of them get it regardless. I don’t know why that security updates page even exists; there’s probably some law they’re just trying to do the minimum to appease so they don’t get sued. It’s not like Kindles are a major security risk so none of this really matters much. Most “security” fixes for Kindles are just closing ways to jailbreak and making DRM removal harder.
Of course, if you don’t register your Kindle then it won’t connect to your account and there’s no reason to even worry about security.
Yet another reason to A) Make your current Kindle your last Kindle and B) Deregister this last Kindle; sideloading your library instead.
This deregistering and a few other hacks — like using Calibre to automatically add the book’s tags to its name (so you can find all books in a category by searching in the name) and like disabling Amazon’s buggy text indexing — make Kindle (almost) as usable as most other e-readers. Not entirely but my PaperWhite is certainly a lot more stable — it used to crash daily & now it doesn’t at all — and far less annoying to use.