Java is a programming language (first implemented by Sun Microsystems) used most often to enhance web pages. Oracle’s Sun Java Runtime Environment (JRE) is one of the most popular Java interpreters currently used.

Java is a programming language (first implemented by Sun Microsystems) used most often to enhance web pages. Today, many operating systems (OS) implement a Java interpreter to recognize and process Java code from websites and other sources, although some operating systems are beginning to depreciate their Java support for security reasons. Oracle’s Sun Java Runtime Environment (JRE) is one of the most popular Java interpreters currently used.

This week, Oracle released their quarterly Critical Patch Update (CPU) for January 2013. CPUs are collections of security updates, which fix vulnerabilities in a wide-range of Oracle products. This quarter’s updates fix 86 vulnerabilities in many different Oracle products and suites.

Java is a programming language (first implemented by Sun Microsystems) used most often to enhance web pages. Most operating systems today implement a Java interpreter to recognize and process Java code from websites and other sources. Oracle’s Sun Java Runtime Environment (JRE) is one of the most popular Java interpreters currently used.

This week, Oracle released their quarterly Critical Patch Update (CPU) for October 2012, as well as a separate Java SE security patch. Apple also released OS X Java updates, in relation to Oracle’s Java patch. I describe all these updates below.

Last week, I posted an alert about some highly critical flaws in Oracle Java; especially one in particular (CVE-2012-4681), which attackers have aggressively exploited in the wild. If an attacker can lure you to a web page or link containing malicious Java content, he can exploit these flaws to execute code on your computer, potentially gaining complete control of it. Oracle released an out-of-cycle update last week to fix this vulnerability, and two others.

Java is a programming language (first implemented by Sun Microsystems) used most often to enhance web pages. Most operating systems today implement a Java interpreter to recognize and process Java code from websites and other sources. Oracle’s Sun Java Runtime Environment (JRE) is one of the most popular Java interpreters currently used.