OS X Snow Leopard (10.6) shipped with Java 6 pre-installed and Java 7 is not available.

Most Windows systems with Java installed will also have a Java entry in the Control Panel, but this is buggy and not reliable. On both systems look for an entry starting with Java 6 or Java 7. In XP look in Add or Remove Programs, on Windows 7 look in Programs and Features. Windows users can easily see if Java is installed in the Control Panel. Offline use is either all-on or all-off and the only way to get to all-off is to uninstall Java. There is, as far as I know, no way to restrict the offline use of Java, that is, Java used by installed applications. Much of this article, and what you'll find elsewhere online, focuses on disabling Java in web browsers, the online half of the equation. This points up an interesting point that's often overlooked - Java is used both online and offline. US-CERT warns that 'applications that use the Internet Explorer web content rendering components, such as Microsoft Office or Windows Desktop Search, may also be used as an attack vector for this vulnerability'. The security section of Microsoft's website has nothing about the latest Java flaw.

The current Java flaw boils down to this: view a web page, get infected with a virus. Nothing said here about Java applies to Javascript. Java and Javascript are totally different. Java is not available at all on iOS (iPhone, iPad) and although it plays a big part in Android, the current issue is with Java from Oracle which does not run on Android. The safest operating system, in my opinion, is Google's Chrome OS which also does not support Java. The latest flaw has been shown to exist in all three systems. To begin in the beginning, Java is available on Windows, OS X and Linux. Windows, OS X and Linux users can get the latest edition of Java 7 at /en/download/manual.jsp Java 6 was not updated as the latest problem was limited to Java 7. 13, 2013 Oracle released Java 7 Update 11 to fix the latest security flaw. Details of the problem are available from many other sources, here, I will put it in context and concentrate on using Java as safely as possible. For whatever reason, the latest bug seems to have gotten much more publicity than the many equally serious Java flaws the preceded it. Here we go again, there is yet another critical security problem with Java.

Is java safe to