South African Centre for Information Security: Leading Information Security Consulting Firm

Information security overview.

Information Security relates to tools and techniques that protect an organisation's valuable assets against loss, disclosure, or damage.

Iit is important to point out that InfoSec is only part of a comprehensive security effort

This concept of security applies to all information. In this context, the valuable assets are the data or information recorded, processed, stored, shared, transmitted, or retrieved from an electronic medium. The data or information is protected against harm from threats that will lead to its loss, inaccessibility, alteration, or wrongful disclosure. The protection is achieved through a layered series of technological and non-technological safeguards such as physical security measures, user identifiers, passwords, smart cards, biometrics, firewalls, etc. Security Objective:

Information Security: Those attributes of a system that provide information and system assets protection

•Confidentiality (protection from unauthorized view or possession)

•Integrity (protection from unauthorized modification or removal)

•Availability (having information and processes available when needed)

Confidentiality, Integrity, Availability is often shortened to “CIA”

Sometimes “Accountability” (knowing what, who, when, and how information is accessed) is added to the list of “CIA”, but accountability is more of a management issue rather than a security property.

Bottom line for you is keeping your

•Business

•Employees

•Customers

safe, secure, and available.

Information Security is all about maintaining proper control over your information

The objective of information security is "the protection of the interests of those relying on information, and the information systems and communications that deliver the information, from harm resulting from failures of availability, confidentiality, and integrity".

For any organization, the security objective is met when:

information systems are available and usable when required (availability);
data and information are disclosed only to those who have a right to know it (confidentiality); and
data and information are protected against unauthorized modification (integrity). The relative priority and significance of availability, confidentiality, and integrity vary according to the data within the information system and the business context in which it is used.