Java patch release did not place millions at risk, says Sun

Filed in archive Security on July 24, 2007

Do you remember that after much dilly dallying Sun had offered a patch for the Java flaw for which it had received a lot of criticism from various security firms? The Java Network Launching Protocol flaw had put around three billions devices at risk as a result but Sun says that the problem was not that big as was being projected.

Here is what the various security firms had to say on this matter:

eEye, a US security firm criticized Sun for not pushing the patch to its millions of customers who did not visit their website where the patch was made available where eEye, another security firm stated that Sun's tortoise approach gave hackers a chance to reverse engineer the patch which could place its customer at a huge disadvantage.

Though the company may try and defy its move but this step surely placed its customers in jeopardy. How far is this move justifiable?