Java and MOA Website Issues

According to a very recent article, US Homeland Security has said that computer users should disable Java because it has a vulnerability with no known fix. Apple had done this remotely for Mac users of its several newest OS versions but if like most, you run a PC with IE or other, you will need to do this manually. There is a PC Mag article with instructions.

My AV software displayed js files as the cause of recent MOA site problems which were apparently attacks to either steal personal identity info from users, allow remote computer control or both.

So a couple questions for our site tech folks
1) To what extent does disabling Java prevent or minimize js- originated problems for the user or the site managers?
2) Any comments on this subject?

And for the BMW MOA office- who is responsible for doing this on the office machines and when? Especially any machine that stores or has access to membership data amd am internet connection

Yes, Java apparently has several long running "exploits" and there was another one reported yesterday. Oracle, Java's owner since it bought Sun Microsystems a few years ago, hasn't been able to fix these problems.

However, I don't belive that the MOA forum relies on Java. There may be some confusion because the forum does rely on Javascript (.js files), which sounds like it might be the same thing, but is actually unrelated.

(The Netscape folks introduced this confusion long ago because they believed that tying their browser scripting language to Sun's machine-independent programming system would give it added oomph, and maybe it did.)

Very simple to disable Java if running version 7 or above. Go to control panel, select Java, go to security, and uncheck the box that says enable java bla bla bla. Hit apply, than ok and reboot . You have just completed the dreaded task. No biggie.