Oracle has unloaded a hefty package of patches aimed at fixing critical vulnerabilities in Java SE and Java for Business, and Oracle as well as third-party security experts are urging IT admins to deploy the security update immediately.

Microsoft is expanding its roster of SDL (security development lifecycle) tools and services with the beta release of an attack surface analyzer tool as well as the introduction of consulting services on secure development.

After over 10 years of active participation in the honeypot community, I was surprised not to have heard of MicroSolved's HoneyPoint Security Server before I started planning this roundup. HoneyPoint runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X, and offers some useful features -- such as "defensive fuzzing" and the ability to track alert status -- that KFSensor and Honeyd don't. But HoneyPoint is neither as easy and complete as KFSensor, nor as flexible and scalable as Honeyd.

Many businesses will not be able to support Microsoft's Windows Phone 7 operating system, which began shipping in the U.S. today. Like the competing Google Android, Windows Phone 7 does not support on-device encryption to protect data stored on it. Many businesses require such encryption to be able to access corporate data through EAS (Exchange ActiveSync) policies and automatically block connections from devices that don't support device-level encryption.

Microsoft released this week an upgrade to a tool that helps secure applications for the Internet without having to recode them.