J7u17 WEB_JAVA_SECURITY_LEVEL= doesnt work?

Question

Anyone else notice that if you try to invoke the installer switch "WEB_JAVA_SECURITY_LEVEL=" its ignored when installing the EXE per the documented standards here?:
[http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/webnotes/install/windows/jre-installer-options.html#running]
We have tested with Windows 7SP1x64 and XPSP3(x86) and both refuse to honor the switch and it always leaves it in the default setting of "HIGH".
Anyone successful in actually getting it to work?
Im also not against editing the MSI to use that setting if it actually works, but I cant find documentation that tells where to adjust that setting. I found every setting we need to tweak EXCEPT that one.... which of course is our biggest headache.

Answer 1

I've had issues with the security level too. One of the problems is that the security level is a user-based setting. So even if you get it to work, if an other user logs into the system it will default to a high level of security. The solution I'm using can be found here:
http://docs.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/technotes/guides/deployment/deployment-guide/properties.html
Create the following file
C:\WINDOWS\Sun\Java\Deployment\deployment.properties
Open it with notepad and put the following lines in the file:
deployment.security.level=MEDIUM
deployment.security.level.locked
This system-level deployment.properties overwrites the user-level deployment.properties file. The first line sets the security level to medium, however, users still have the ability to change the setting. The second line locks the setting so it cannot be change. On 7v17 you can also use "LOW" but in 7u21 they've removed the option for low security settings.
It's work noting that the key "deployment.security.level" is not documented on the link posted above. You can find what user-level settings are being applied by looking at:
C:\Documents and Settings\adminbh\Application Data\Sun\Java\Deployment\deployment.properties
-or- C:\Users\hardesty\AppData\LocalLow\Sun\Java\Deployment\deployment.properties
-or- in the registry HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\JavaSoft\DeploymentProperties