Cyber security vulnerability
Bryan States
University of Maryland University College Professor
CSEC 610
July 7, 2015
Introduction An analysis on the vulnerabilities as well as the use of cyber intrusions in an organizational network has become key for running businesses (Sengupta, Mazumdar & Bagchi, 2011). Enterprises including academic facilities, government parastatals and manufacturing firms are started to carry out business. The organizations mentioned above will in one way or another need an enterprise network to ensure that there is smooth running of operations for success in their undertakings. The network is made up of software and hardware systems, transmission media, devices and employees. Different organizations
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Since the subnets can serve to expose a company, ensuring identification of threats is critical for survival of information systems. In other words, the weaknesses in the information systems can act as a basis on which harmful results to the operation of the company evolve. Managers in the information technology sector are faced with various challenges. Above all, the single most cybersecurity vulnerability remains to be individuals or employees in organizations. This is because lapses in the security system always start with members of staff. Moreover, the above-mentioned individuals are the primary defense mechanism. The range of activities that come up as a result of human error are many, most of the time involving acts of trespass, extortion, vandalism and even theft. The reason behind vulnerability is in the fact that efforts of protection are easily defeated and would only require a person who is against your interests in a particular way. An example is a scenario where an employee decides to infect the system of an organization with a virus. Nevertheless, the same person could become negligent in his duties and give an unauthorized colleague usernames and passwords to systems. The consequences that lie in this would be dire in that it can facilitate crime and sharing of files, which may be considered confidential by a company. Once such confidential information reaches the wrong hands, it can be damaging. On one hand, it can be used for blackmail,
In today’s IT world every organization has a responsibility to protect the information and sensitive data they have. Protecting data is not only responsibility of security and IT staff but every individual is involved in protecting the information. The risks to information security are not digital only, but it involves technology, people and process that an organization may have. These threats may represent the problems that are associated to complex and expensive solution, but doing nothing about these risks is not the solution.
Security will always be a driving emphasis for the success of an organization. As technology continues to grow and develop, there is a greater need for understanding threat environments. The growing anxiety with security and privacy concerns make receiving a virus on a personal or company computer dangerous. It is vital that both individuals and organizations take the time to understand how to protect themselves from schemes used by hackers. It only takes one mistake for a hacker to have control of your computer. A proper understanding of security offers direction for improving business procedures and educating users of acceptable threat management and authentication practices. The management of network and application security
This author addresses the central concerns regarding information security in the modern business world using broad strokes to make the importance of network security as a key business operation readily apparent to the reader. As the article is addressed primarily on business managers and other practically interested personnel, the language is a bit too full of professional jargon and other needless complications, however the basic facts that the author lays out and the conclusions drawn from these facts and their relationship are quite straightforward and clear. Though not providing any truly in-depth and concrete data or profound insights, this presents overview information that is directly related to the investigation of network and information security.
Security services are an integral part of any network design. Assessing the vulnerability of network infrastructure to disruptive events is recognized as an important component of network planning and analysis. This section provides an overview of common network infrastructure vulnerabilities, essential network security concepts analysis and present. It illustrates the possible placement of servers including access paths to the Internet, intrusion detection systems (IDS), and firewalls. This paper also describes a comprehensive security policy for a company including ethical aspects related to employee behavior, contractors, password usage, and access to networked resources and information.
Cyber security as a vital element that should be addressed by business organizations, especially by the executive board as it has a great impact on business performance. Hence, the traditional approach used by the group to curb the menace is not adequate for the development of firewalls and anti-virus are embraced (Fugini et al., 2016). Therefore, it is imperative to appreciate that a better approach should be employed that guarantees the management of efficient organizational structure among other critical issues.
Information Technology (IT) managers are constantly tasked with evaluating their organization’s overall security posture and reporting the greatest vulnerabilities to leadership. Senior management is often surprised to hear that the greatest vulnerability within an organization is not a misconfigured firewall or a virus being forwarded across an internal e-mail server, but rather a human being. When compared to a piece of hardware or software, a human user is easily the single most targeted weakness within an organization.
Some of the potentially greatest threats to our national security revolve around that of a computer network. These networks are vulnerable to human error, negligence, and internal sabotages. In the years of 2014 and 2015 the United States Intelligence Community’s threat assessment placed cyber security as the top priority. External attacks on computer mainframes and data networks that contain critical intelligence are being recognized as the nation’s most vulnerable weakness and steps must be taken to combat the threat of the digital age. I predict that the weakest link to cyber security is not policy or macro-cyber protection efforts, but actually on an individual personnel level. Thus, I propose the idea of a physical line of defense consisting of counter-cyber personnel. This paper will attempt to analyze the nature of cyber security and how cyber attacks can pose a threat to national security. I will also suggest solutions on how to mitigate the risks and problems that arise in creating a flexible, and capable cyber defense policy.
Organizational entities which store sensitive data and information have the responsibility of ensuring that the data are secure. Ensuring that this particular data and information are secure will more than likely be the responsibility of the Information Technology Security Executive. These executives will be required to implement the protocol and, software that will deter and prevent the different types of attacks that their organization faces. Some of the attacks include cyber- attacks, intrusion attacks, network attacks, and social engineering attacks. This paper will present research and comparison of methods of cyber-attacks, intrusion attacks and network attacks.
As networks continue to increase with industry growth, information security demands more and more attention. Security breaches are triggering a lack of trust among patrons and loss of revenue to many businesses. Protecting an organization’s data is the responsibility of any user who accesses a network or maintains a network. Employees—usually those outside the IT team—require proper training and a sense of urgency to prevent attacks.
The present Information Security technology seems insufficient to totally deal with all the ICT problems of the organization. As per Bob Blakley, Ellen McDermott and Dan Geer, the present security technology available doesn’t reduce the risk very effectively (Blakley, McDermott, & Geer, 2002). A need is imminent to totally revamp the approach if the Organizations aspire to deal effectively with the problem. Information Security is essential because the technology used for processing data and generating information creates risks.
Every company needs some sort of security protection for their information system. According to Sam Musa, “The goal of information security is to ensure confidentiality, integrity and availability of the data.” Data breaches happen all the time and companies set up security systems to protect their data. There are three important factors needed to have a successful security system. The first, protecting and defending data through a cyber-security system. Second, operating and maintaining the systems set up to protect and defend data. Lastly, the investigation of data breaches and crimes that happen around the world will help adapt and improve security systems made to protect your data. The effects a cybercrime can incur are very costly and the steps needed to recover are discussed later. Cyber security is extremely important to Management Information Systems (MIS) because if you do not have security for your systems all your data could be stolen, lost, or worse shown to the public. In working in MIS, company data is all around you and it is your job to keep that data safe.
Organizations which rely on network infrastructure for their business operation must utilize security technology to protect the network from harmful actions of automated attacks as well as malicious human activity. It is also important to enact policies and guidelines for the employees of the organization, which in many regards can be the weakest link in the chain of security. According to a survey by The Ponemon Institute (2012), “78 percent of respondents said their organizations have experienced a data breach as a result of negligent or malicious employees or other insiders” (p.1). A statistic like this points to the need for comprehensive policies that detail the company’s expectations and mandates for specific situations relating to
There has been a significant rise in information security incidents (Leakage of knowledge, valuable corporate information, personal information, etc.) over the years that compromise the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information and information assets of a particular organization and lead to a significant financial losses, reputational damage, operational downtime, loss of
Within any organization, Information Security and Assurance has a huge role in protecting the network systems by all means necessary. This is why the Information Security and Assurance Department plays a key role in defeating the threat of today and the future. The first and foremost task we must execute is to conduct an analysis on the current information technology systems. Upon recognizing and discovering several issues within the organization’s existing information technology systems, we can start preparing resolutions for each and every one of them. To protect your sensitive information and systems, you must avoid a fortress mentality and be capable of adapting to an ever-changing environment Vladimirov, A. A., Gavrilenko, K. V., Mikhailovsky, A. A., ebrary, I., & Ebrary. (2010). Possessing the criterion for Information Security and Assurance with the specialization in CyberSecurity, I set forth the following proposal, The Information Security and Assurance Initiative. This program is to design, educate, and maintain an IT platform to support and answer the organization’s mission, visions, and goals without compromising the systems’ integrity and security. We will form an Information Security and Assurance Department that has the capability, experience and professionalism to bring this program to the next level without compromising the integrity and security of this organization.
As organizations reliance on technology continues to grow so has the amount of cyber attacks which occur compromising organizations information systems and networks. These cyber attacks can have drastic effect on organization financially including downtime or even regulatory fines. Due to this the need to be able to properly identify assets, their vulnerabilities and threats, and the risk they pose to the organization has become a must for ensuring the protection of organizations information systems and networks. This have gave way to the creation of threat modeling process to aid organizations beater identify and mitigate the risk to their organizations security.