Apple, Cisco and Oracle release patches

A trio of security fixes have been posted by some of the biggest names in computing.

Days after Microsoft released its monthly security update, Apple, Cisco and Oracle have released security updates of their own.

For Apple, the update addresses a vulnerability in the 10.5 and 10.6 versions of both MacOS X and MacOS X Server. Discovered by security researcher Charlie Miller, the flaw could allow an attacker to exploit the Type Services component and remotely execute code on a targeted system.

Cisco's patch addresses an ActiveX vulnerability in its Secure Desktop offering. If exploited, it too could allow an attacker to remotely execute code by way of a web-based attack.

Oracle issued an update to its newly acquired Java platform. The Java SE update patches a pair of remote code execution vulnerabilities in the handling of web-based Java applications. The company noted that the vulnerabilities were not a risk for Java server deployments or desktop Java applications.

The Java update comes just two days after Oracle released its scheduled monthly update. That patch addressed 47 different vulnerabilities in software from both Oracle and Sun.