A news report posted a couple of hours ago indicates some "features" for the latest Apple Security Update that may include reasons for some Apple users - and Windows users of Safari - to be concerned.

I will NOT POST a link to the article, because the URL that comes up looks slightly "strange" (why would a link URL need to be 492 characters long and identify both my ISP and my home page in the link????) Maybe later if I figure out what's going on.

You should be able to find the article easily via msnbc.com under "US News" or several other msnbc pages, or at SecurityNews if interested, and Norton gives the report (and the bizarre url) both clean readings.

The significant part of the report is:

[quoting]

Apple security update ditches Snow Leopard, Windows users

Almost all those vulnerabilities expose users to attack by maliciously crafted Web pages

By Paul Wagenseil
Security News
31 July 2012

Last week, Apple released the latest version of its Safari Web browser, patching more than 100 vulnerabilities. But if you're running an older version of Mac OS X or any version of Windows, you're in for some harsh luck.

Safari 6 is available only for the brand-new OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion and its predecessor, OS X 10.7 Lion, which itself is barely a year old.

Users of Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, which as of June was running on nearly 40 percent of all Macs, apparently won't be getting the upgrade.

As for Safari for Windows, Apple has removed all traces of it from its website.

A request to Apple for comment was not immediately returned. ...

[end quote]

There's a little more in the original article, but the couple of things that might be of interest to people here are that:

a) what appears to be a significant security update (127 vulnerabilities mentioned?) will not be available to users of Apple OS versions that apparently haven't been out long enough for people to get well acquainted with them.

b) Safari for Windows has "been disappeared" from the Apple website.

There may be perfectly innocent reasons for the rather unusual nature of the release, but it seems worth watching for further reports to see if explanations appear - if anyone sees reasons to be concerned.

John