Building Information Security Core Competencies: A Guide for CISOs and C|CISO Candidates

What does a chief information security officer do, and what are the various CISO roles and responsibilities? As an organization’s most important IT security professional, the CISO is tasked with defending the business from external attackers and cyber threats.

Qualified CISOs must be familiar with many core information security competencies. Below, we’ll look at some essential IT security topics and how CISOs and C|CISO candidates can learn them.

The Fundamentals of Information Security

The IT security field stretches back decades, and organizations have settled on several information security fundamentals and best practices. Just a few of these are:

• Network security: The practice of network security focuses on protecting a company’s network infrastructure from cyber threats such as unauthorized access and data breaches. Solid network security measures include deploying firewalls, IDS/IPS (intrusion detection/prevention systems), secure protocols, and VPNs (virtual private networks). These solutions help safeguard the integrity and confidentiality of information and resources within the organization’s network.
• Encryption: Data encryption is crucial to protect sensitive information in transit and at rest. Effective data encryption relies on converting information into an encoded format using an encryption key; this information can only be decoded and understood with a corresponding decryption key (sometimes the same as the encryption key). Encrypting data ensures that it remains incomprehensible and unusable by anyone except the intended recipient(s), even if it falls into the wrong hands.
• Vulnerability management: It involves proactively identifying, assessing, and mitigating the security vulnerabilities in an IT environment. This requires security assessments, vulnerability scanning, and penetration testing to detect potential weaknesses an attacker can exploit. Organizations can then take preventive actions such as installing patches, software updates, and security solutions.
• Incident response: Organizations must have well-defined and effective plans for responding to security incidents when cyber defenses fail. Incident response involves formulating strategies for events and threats like data breaches or ransomware infections. Effective incident response plans define the roles and responsibilities of IT professionals during a security event and outline the steps to follow to restore normal business operations.

To be effective, CISOs must be familiar with these and other information security fundamentals. These skills and best practices collectively form a solid foundation for IT security, enabling organizations to establish robust defenses against malicious actors. Unfortunately, far too few CISOs measure up to this task: a Gartner study revealed that just 12 percent of CISOs are considered “highly effective.”

Risk Assessment in Information Security

Beyond the fundamental topics listed above, the practice of risk assessment in information security is a crucial component of the CISO job description. The good news is that most CISOs take the risk of cyber attacks seriously. According to a 2023 survey by Proofpoint, 68 percent of CISOs believe their organization is at risk of a cyber attack in the next 12 months, and 25 percent rate this event “very likely.”

The process of risk assessment involves steps such as:

• Identifying assets: The first risk assessment stage involves determining the assets and resources within an organization’s IT infrastructure. These may include hardware, software applications, network devices, data, and intellectual property. By determining the IT assets, CISOs can better prioritize their security efforts and protect the most vulnerable or valuable resources.
• Evaluating threats: The next stage of risk assessment in information security requires CISOs to evaluate the likely threats that their organization faces. Hazards to an IT infrastructure can come from external attackers, insider threats, human error, and natural disasters that can significantly disrupt business operations. CISOs must consider each threat’s nature, capabilities, and likelihood and develop appropriate countermeasures and incident response plans.
• Determining vulnerabilities: Risk assessment involves identifying and mitigating security vulnerabilities and flaws within an IT environment. Malicious actors can find and exploit these weaknesses to launch an attack or extend their reach within the environment. This process involves conducting vulnerability assessments and penetration testing to detect and address weaknesses before attackers discover them.

Conducting risk assessments at regular intervals is a crucial task for CISOs. The cyber security landscape constantly evolves, with new threats and vulnerabilities emerging.

The Operational Aspects of Information Security

Last but not least, the role of CISO—and the function of information security—requires a significant day-to-day operational aspect. The operational components of strong IT security include:

• Security monitoring: Security monitoring involves continuously observing an organization’s IT environment for suspicious events and potential security incidents. This includes monitoring and collecting logs on network traffic, user behavior, and other relevant data sources to identify unusual or unauthorized actions. Security monitoring is often performed by a security operations center (SOC), using tools such as SIEM (security information and event management) to achieve 24/7 visibility into an IT environment
• Incident detection: The goal of monitoring is prompt and accurate incident detection: finding security incidents and events as they occur. IT security professionals use manual and automated incident detection techniques, such as behavioral analytics and machine learning, to identify anomalous patterns and activities. As a result, security analysts can more effectively distinguish normal user activities and traffic from worrisome indicators of compromise (IoCs).
• Incident response: As discussed above, incident response responds to security events identified through incident detection. Incident response involves a series of coordinated, planned actions to contain the incident, mitigate or prevent its impact, remove the threat to the IT environment, and reestablish normal business operations. Effective CISOs create incident response plans for various security events with their IT security teams, including data breaches, malware infections, and denial of service (DoS) attacks.

The operational aspects of information security demand constant vigilance from CISOs. As security threats become more advanced and damaging, CISOs must ensure that security teams are prepared to handle these threats via methods such as training and education programs, simulated attacks and exercises, and penetration testing.

Continuous Professional Development for CISOs and C|CISO Candidates

The role of CISO demands a great deal of knowledge of and experience with information security. Moreover, with the cybersecurity landscape continuously shifting, CISOs must stay on their toes to be adequately prepared to address the latest threats and vulnerabilities.

This means that continuous professional development is key for CISOs and aspiring CISOs. Programs such as EC-Council’s Certified Chief Information Security Officer (C|CISO) certification offer IT professionals the fundamental skills and training to assume the mantle of CISO effectively.

The C|CISO curriculum has been developed by existing CISOs who know what it takes to serve as chief information security officers. C|CISO covers the five essential domains of CISO knowledge:

1. Governance and risk management
2. Information security controls, compliance, and audit management
3. Security program management and operations
4. Information security core competencies
5. Strategic planning, finance, procurement, and vendor management

Source: eccouncil.org

Continue reading

Fortifying Cloud-Native Environments: Experts Insights on the Evolution of Cloud Security

In today’s rapidly evolving IT landscape, one concept stands out as a game-changer: cloud-native computing. As organizations transition from traditional on-premises infrastructure to cloud-based solutions, they are altering where their data and applications reside and how they are built, deployed, and secured in this ever-shifting digital terrain. To understand the knowledge of a holistic approach to cloud-native security, we interviewed Priyanka Kulkarni Joshi, a past Researcher and a craver to be a CISO and Cybersecurity Specialist at UBS, specializing in online security research, planning, execution, and maintenance.

Priyanka is also an expert in audits and risk management, ethical hacking, and compliance and has previously managed various freelance security projects. She has excellent managerial skills and an impressive track record in the IT security industry and was nominated as the 2020 Cyber Spartans Award winner. Through her experience in cloud security, she delves deep into the transformative power of cloud-native environments and, more crucially, security’s pivotal role in this shift. The article also explores the fundamental challenges and best practices and provides insights into safeguarding your cloud-native infrastructure.

What is the significance of cloud-native security in modern IT environments?

The significance of cloud-native security in the modern IT environment lies in customizing security capabilities for cloud platforms. Implementing cloud-native security is crucial for safeguarding companies against potential threats and unauthorized access to their data stored in the cloud. This includes sensitive business content related to client orders, designs, requirements, financial information, etc. Additionally, this measure aids in averting data leaks and the theft of sensitive information. Safeguarding data is paramount for upholding the trust of your customers and securing the assets that underpin your competitive edge.

What common security challenges are specific to cloud-native applications and infrastructure?

Some of the most common challenges in security implementation cloud be listed as:

1. Cost of security resources
2. Lack of visibility in a distributed system
3. Reliability issues
4. Keeping up to date with outdated technologies
5. Monitoring microservices.
6. Ability to filter important metrics from the pool of metrics
7. Identifying the right tools or platforms.
8. Security and compliance
9. Lack of technical expertise

Can you help us understand the shared responsibility model from the perspective of containerized application security?

The shared responsibility model in containerized applications is a security and compliance framework that portrays the obligations of cloud service providers and container security stakeholders. It is a critical part of a comprehensive security assessment, which protects the application from potential risk and uses a combination of security tools and policies. As the definition simplifies, this model is responsible for every aspect of the cloud environment where the data security in the cloud encryption of data at rest and data in transit and group configuration would be saved when applied to the containerized applications in use.

What are the best practices for securing serverless applications in a cloud-native architecture?

The best practice to ensure serverless security involves securely storing sensitive data (such as credentials, PII, SSN, etc.) in protected databases. Further security enhancement can be achieved by managing and restricting access, ensuring a secure and limited accessibility framework.

Some best practices can be practiced as follows:

• Minimize the function roles
• Monitor the log functions
• Employ API gateways
• Scan always for a bad code (review each before it’s out)
• Perimeter security should be tough, and the function levels as well.

By upholding this practice, we can assign specific privileges to individual functions, ensuring that these privileges are confined to the narrowest scope required. This approach enhances perimeter security and mitigates potential attacks’ impact.

How can you ensure the security of microservices and APIs in a cloud-native ecosystem?

Ensuring the security of microservices and APIs in a cloud-native ecosystem is a huge task, and both APIs and microservices play a key role in cloud-native environments; microservices serve as the cornerstone of distributed and shared computing resources. Conversely, APIs are a very efficient way to streamline the operations and development tasks with the operational team and ensure that the services used each time are properly isolated from the other tasks.

There are a few ways that we can secure the microservices architecture:

• Use HTTPS
• Scan for any dependencies
• Mitigate loopholes
• Cover security bases
• Use access and identity tokens
• Know, the cloud and cluster securities
• TLS security and secret management
• Extended authentication needs to be managed.
• Access logging

What, according to you, are the key components and considerations to achieve a comprehensive cloud-native security strategy?

Some of the key components for a comprehensive cloud-native security can be listed as:

• Data protection
• Incident response
• Detection controls
• Access management
• Encryption management

What do you best suggest for responding to a security breach or incident in a cloud-native environment?

Responding to a security breach or incident in a cloud-native environment should be like the cyber incident response. In contrast, a cloud-native attack breach frequently follows a typical progression of a legitimate user account compromise, account reconnaissance, privilege escalation, resource exploitation, data exfiltration, and credentials. The cloud incident response is similar to traditional incident response regarding planning, procedures, and controls that facilitate incident detection and response action. However, as cloud deployment involves a shared responsibility model, having a little knowledge about cloud deployment incident preparation key and the incident strategy would ensure an effective response to the security incidents, which will help businesses effectively navigate IT disruption.

Source: eccouncil.org

Continue reading

The Role of an Information Security Analyst in Safeguarding Your Digital Assets

In the fast-evolving digital landscape, the security of sensitive data has become paramount. Cyber threats and attacks are on the rise, making it imperative for businesses to fortify their defenses. This is where Information Security Analysts step into the spotlight. In this comprehensive guide, we'll delve into the crucial role played by Information Security Analysts and how they safeguard your digital assets from potential threats.

Understanding the Information Security Analyst

Information Security Analysts, often referred to as Cybersecurity Analysts, are the unsung heroes of the digital world. Their primary responsibility is to protect an organization's computer systems and networks. They meticulously plan and implement security measures to ensure the integrity, confidentiality, and availability of data. This involves continuous monitoring, vulnerability assessments, and proactive threat detection.

The Key Responsibilities of an Information Security Analyst

1. Risk Assessment: Information Security Analysts begin by assessing the vulnerabilities within an organization's network. This involves identifying potential weaknesses and evaluating their potential impact on the business.
2. Security Implementation: After identifying potential threats, analysts proceed to implement security measures. This can include the installation of firewalls, antivirus software, and encryption protocols.
3. Continuous Monitoring: Security doesn't end with implementation. Analysts constantly monitor the network for any suspicious activities, ensuring that any threats are detected and neutralized in real-time.
4. Incident Response: In the unfortunate event of a security breach, Information Security Analysts take the lead in managing the incident. They work to minimize damage, recover lost data, and investigate the root cause.
5. Compliance: Analysts are well-versed in legal and regulatory requirements related to data protection. They ensure that their organization complies with all relevant laws and standards.

The Importance of Information Security Analysts

Protecting Sensitive Data

In today's digital age, data is often referred to as the "new oil." Organizations store vast amounts of sensitive information, from customer details to financial records. Information Security Analysts are the guardians of this data, ensuring it remains out of the reach of malicious actors.

Safeguarding Reputation

A data breach not only results in financial losses but can also irreparably damage a company's reputation. Analysts work tirelessly to prevent such incidents, maintaining trust with customers and stakeholders.

Maintaining Business Continuity

In the event of a cyberattack, business operations can come to a grinding halt. Information Security Analysts play a pivotal role in ensuring that systems and data are quickly restored, minimizing downtime.

The Skills and Expertise Required

Information Security Analysts are highly skilled professionals. They possess a combination of technical and analytical skills that enable them to effectively secure digital environments. Some key skills and expertise include:

Technical Proficiency

• Network Security: Analysts are well-versed in configuring and maintaining firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and encryption protocols.
• Penetration Testing: They understand how to simulate cyberattacks to identify vulnerabilities within the system.
• Software Knowledge: Proficiency in security software such as antivirus programs and intrusion detection systems is a must.

Analytical Skills

• Critical Thinking: Analysts can assess complex situations, identify patterns, and make informed decisions.
• Problem-Solving: They are adept at finding innovative solutions to security challenges.

Communication Skills

• Reporting: Analysts must communicate security risks and incidents to both technical and non-technical stakeholders.
• Documentation: They maintain detailed records of security incidents and measures taken to mitigate them.

The Evolving Landscape of Information Security

The role of an Information Security Analyst is not static. It constantly evolves to keep pace with the ever-changing threat landscape. New challenges, technologies, and attack vectors emerge regularly. Analysts must stay ahead of the curve by engaging in continuous learning and professional development.

Emerging Trends

1. Cloud Security: With the proliferation of cloud services, analysts must adapt their strategies to protect data stored in the cloud.
2. IoT Security: The Internet of Things introduces a new array of devices, all of which require secure integration into the network.
3. Machine Learning and AI: Analysts are increasingly using artificial intelligence and machine learning to detect and prevent threats.
4. Zero Trust Security: This approach involves verifying the identity of anyone trying to access a network, regardless of their location.

The Information Security Analyst in Action

To truly understand the significance of Information Security Analysts, let's consider a hypothetical scenario:

Imagine a financial institution that houses a treasure trove of customer data, including personal information and financial records. In the digital age, this information is constantly under threat from cybercriminals seeking to exploit any weaknesses in the system.

The Information Security Analysts at this institution work diligently to protect this valuable data. They implement cutting-edge security protocols, monitor the network round the clock, and conduct regular security assessments. In a world of constant cyber threats, these experts are the first line of defense.

Conclusion

In a world where cyber threats are as real as physical ones, Information Security Analysts are the unsung heroes who ensure that your digital assets remain safe and secure. Their expertise, technical prowess, and unwavering dedication are the bedrock of a secure digital environment. As the threat landscape continues to evolve, these professionals stand ready to defend and protect, ensuring that your data remains yours, and yours alone.

Continue reading

How Well Aligned Information Security Programs Help Business Grow

Information security is a top priority for businesses, but ensuring that information security aligns with business objectives can be a challenge. Many factors need to be considered when designing an information security strategy, such as the type of data being protected and the risks associated with its loss or unauthorized access. In order to ensure that information security aligns with business objectives, businesses need to take a holistic approach that considers all aspects of the organization. Here we’ll explore how information security can be aligned with business objectives and discuss some key considerations for doing so.

Why Information Security and Business Objectives Should Be in Sync

You don’t need to be a chief security officer to know that information security is crucial for businesses. But what many don’t realize is that aligning information security goals with business objectives can be hugely beneficial for an organization.

Read More: 712-50: EC-Council Certified Chief Information Security Officer (CCISO)

When it comes to protecting your data and systems, you need to have a plan in place that covers all the potential threats. These include everything from malicious attacks to accidental data breaches. But if your information security strategy isn’t aligned with your business objectives, you could be missing out on opportunities to improve your overall security posture.

Here are a few reasons why information security and business objectives should be in sync:

1. Improves Security Posture

If you want to reduce the risk of a data breach or other security incident, you must take a holistic approach to information security. This means looking at all the potential threats and vulnerabilities and then implementing controls that mitigate those risks.

However, if your information security strategy isn’t aligned with your business objectives, you could be missing out on opportunities to improve your overall security posture. For example, you might implement a security control that doesn’t address a key vulnerability or fail to deploy a critical security update because it doesn’t fit with the organization’s business goals (Scalzo, C., 2018).

2. Plays a Key Role in Strategic Planning 

Information security is a critical part of any business, and you should include it in your overall strategic planning. However, many organizations fail to take information security into account when they’re developing their business plans. This can lead to problems down the road, such as a lack of response plans in the event of a data breach or other security incident.

Aligning your information security strategy with your business objectives can help you avoid these problems and ensure that information security is given the attention it deserves. Including information security in your strategic planning will allow you to develop effective response plans and make sure that all stakeholders are aware of their roles and responsibilities in the event of a security incident (BizzSecure, 2020).

3. Establishes a Security-Focused Company Culture

Organizations are made up of different departments, each with its own objectives and goals. However, if there’s a disconnect between the information security team and the rest of the organization, it can lead to problems. For example, the marketing department might launch a new campaign without involving the security team, which could result in sensitive data being exposed.

Aligning your information security strategy with your business objectives can help you ensure that all departments are working together towards a common goal. In addition, establishing a security-focused company culture can help everyone in the organization understand the importance of information security and their role in protecting the company’s data.

4. Helps Mitigate Risks at Touch Points

One of the most important aspects of information security management is protecting your data from unauthorized access. There are many ways that attackers can gain access to your data, and having controls in place can mitigate these risks. For example, you might implement a password policy or use two-factor authentication to make it more difficult for attackers to gain access to your systems.

Aligning your information security strategy with your business objectives can help you ensure that you’re taking all the necessary steps to protect your data. This includes identifying all the potential risks and implementing controls that will mitigate those risks.

In addition, you can avoid these problems and improve your overall security posture. Implementing an effective information security strategy can help you protect your data, attract and retain customers, and improve your bottom line. 

Source: eccouncil.org

Continue reading

Difference between Information Security and Network Security

Information Security is the measures taken to protect the information from unauthorized access and use. It provides confidentiality, integrity, and availability. It is the superset that contains cyber security and network security. It is necessary for any organization or firm that works on a large scale. 

Examples and inclusion of Information Security are as follows:

1. Procedural Controls

2. Access Controls

3. Technical Controls

4. Compliance Controls

Network Security: Network Security is the measures taken by any enterprise or organization to secure its computer network and data using both hardware and software systems. This aims at securing the confidentiality and accessibility of the data and network. Every company or organization that handles a large amount of data, has a degree of solutions against many cyber threats. 

Examples and inclusion of Network Security are as follows:

1. Firewall

2. Network Segmentation

3. Remote Access VPN

4. Email Security

5. Intrusion Prevention Systems (IPS)

6. Sandboxing

7. Hyperscale Network Security.

8. Data Loss Prevention (DLP)

Difference between Information Security and Network Security:

Parameters	Information Security	Network Security
Data	It protects information from unauthorized users, access, and data modification.	It protects the data flowing over the network.
Part of	It is a superset of cyber security and network security.	It is a subset of cyber security.
Protection	Information security is for information irrespective of the realm.	It protects anything in the network realm.
Attack	It deals with the protection of data from any form of threat.	It deals with the protection from DOS attacks.
Scope	It strikes against unauthorized access, disclosure modification, and disruption.	Network Security strikes against trojans.
Usage	It provides confidentiality, integrity, and availability.	It provides security over the network only.
Ensures	Information security ensures to the protection of transit and stationary data.	Network security ensures to protect the transit data only.
Deals with	It deals with information assets and integrity, confidentiality, and availability.	It secures the data traveling across the network by terminals.

Source: geeksforgeeks.org

Continue reading

The 3 Biggest Information Security Management Challenges for Leaders in 2022

Cybersecurity is one of the biggest concerns in business, with 48% of CEOs worried that their company might experience a devastating digital attack in the next year (PwC, 2022). This puts the spotlight on CISOs and cybersecurity leaders, who are under pressure to deliver information security management procedures that keep data safe.

In a changing cybersecurity landscape, that’s harder than it sounds. New threats and exploits emerge daily, while hackers keep attempting new strategies. Not only that, but corporate IT infrastructures are also evolving, and new technology always means new vulnerabilities.

Top 3 Information Security Management Challenges of 2022

CISOs and Infosec leaders have to maintain a fine balancing act. On the one hand, you must keep data safe and prevent attacks—but you also have to support growth and innovation, allowing your organization to flourish.

Balancing these competing requirements can lead to serious challenges. To get information security management right in 2022, you must:

1. Support diversified networks

The typical corporate data infrastructure has changed a lot in the past ten years, and that change has only accelerated during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Three of the biggest changes with implications for information security management are:

◉ Working from home: 58% of Americans now have the opportunity to work from home at least once per week (Dua, et al., 2022), and globally, 52% of employees work from home at least once per week (Simovic, 2022). Remote work may involve relying on an unsecured device, such as a personal laptop, or connecting via an unsecured network, such as home or public Wi-Fi.

◉ BYOD policies: 82% of companies in the U.S. have some form of a Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy, which allows users to access internal systems from a personal device (Schulze, 2022). BYOD policies can cover devices such as laptops, phones, and tablets. Such devices are typically dual-purpose (business and personal use).

◉ Third-party ID: Enterprise cloud services often allow users to sign in with a third-party ID, such as Apple ID or Google accounts. Organizations can choose whether to use managed accounts on these services or to allow employees to use their personal IDs.

These changes reflect our current reality, where most people have access to powerful personal electronics, including phones, laptops, and high-speed home internet connections. It’s convenient to allow people to use these devices, especially if they’re working remotely.

However, this means that corporate networks now have a vastly increased number of endpoints, each of which is vulnerable to attack. Managed devices can reduce the associated risk, but most people would prefer the option to use their own devices.

Ultimately, it’s a trade-off between security and ease of use. When organizations choose convenience, it makes information security management that much harder.

2. Safeguard cloud services

Cloud services are almost ubiquitous now, with 89% of enterprises employing a multi-cloud strategy (Flexera, 2022).

This indicates that many businesses trust cloud providers to provide secure services and ensure data availability and integrity. In a 2022 survey of information security management concerns, most CISOs did not list provider-side issues as a primary concern. (Cloud Security Alliance, 2022).

Instead, most IT leaders are worried about vulnerabilities such as:

◉ Credential management: Many organizations take a role-based security approach to ensure that individuals can only access data if they have a legitimate business need. The challenge is to keep credential management systems up to date so that everyone has the appropriate level of access.

◉ Configuration and integration: Information Security Management experts often have to deal with complicated tech stacks with multiple cloud platforms. Individual cloud service providers can help find the optimal security configuration, but things quickly get complex when cross-platform integrations are involved. This level of complexity increases the risk of something going wrong, possibly exposing data.

◉ Insider threats: Cloud services give users a lot of power, as they can easily access sensitive data from their personal devices. This raises the threat of malicious actions—such as when someone downloads customer data and saves it to another device—and threats arising from poor security practices, like when a user leaves their laptop unattended in a public place.

The information security management challenge here is not the fault of the cloud services themselves. Instead, it’s an issue of the security architecture on your side. This includes the kind of software and processes attached to your cloud services and the best practices you teach users.

3. Protect digital assets

For many organizations, data is now their most valuable asset. Data powers customer relationships, provides insights through analytics, and allows internal processes to run smoothly.

Unfortunately, if you have any valuable assets, someone will try to steal them. Businesses are learning to think about data as an asset that requires safeguarding in the same way you protect physical assets like stock and equipment.

The Dark Web is home to a thriving market for stolen digital assets (Ruffio, 2022), which can include:

◉ Financial data: Money is the main motivation for cybercrime, with 86% of hackers seeking a financial advantage (Verizon, 2020). This includes anything that can be used to steal money, such as credit card numbers, banking logins, and access to payment services.

◉ Login credentials: Hackers also want to access individual accounts, so usernames and passwords are highly sought-after. Even if the login details don’t lead to a valuable account, the hackers might gain access to personal data that will help them commit identity theft.

◉ Personal information: Any personal data can be highly valuable, whether it belongs to your customers or employees. Names, addresses, emails, phone numbers, dates of birth, and Social Security Numbers can all help to commit identity fraud or break into other secure accounts.

◉ Proprietary information: Hackers will also seek valuable proprietary data, which can include intellectual property, confidential documents, and product design. This kind of digital asset can often lead to espionage or blackmail.

Ransomware attacks often take these digital assets hostage, with criminals promising the data’s safe return when the victim pays a ransom.

However, many data breaches happen quietly. In some cases, hackers will identify a weakness and continue to harvest data until the organization identifies and repairs the breach. That’s why it’s so important to have the right approach to Information Security Management.

Get Ready for the Information Security Management Challenges Ahead

It’s hard to predict the future, but we know two things for sure: IT infrastructures will keep getting more complicated, and hackers will keep looking for vulnerabilities.

That’s why every organization needs an InfoSec leader ready for the challenges ahead. If you’re working towards the CISO role in your organization, you can take a step forward with the Certified Chief Information Security Officer (C|CISO) program from EC-Council. This certification builds on your existing knowledge of cybersecurity management and teaches you what you’ll need to know to succeed in executive leadership. 

The C|CISO program was developed by seasoned CISOs to help you deliver the right cybersecurity management strategy for your company.

Source: eccouncil.org

Continue reading

Difference between Cyber Security and Information Security

The terms Cyber Security and Information Security are often used interchangeably. As they both are responsible for the security and protecting the computer system from threats and information breaches and often Cybersecurity and information security are so closely linked that they may seem synonymous and unfortunately, they are used synonymously. If we talk about data security it’s all about securing the data from malicious users and threats. Now another question is what is the difference between Data and Information? So one important point is that “not every data can be information” data can be informed if it is interpreted in a context and given meaning. for example “100798” is data and if we know that it’s the date of birth of a person then it is information because it has some meaning. so information means data that has some meaning.

Examples and Inclusion of Cyber Security are as follows:

◉ Network Security

◉ Application Security

◉ Cloud Security

◉ Critical Infrastructure

Examples and inclusion of Information Security are as follows:

◉ Procedural Controls

◉ Access Controls

◉ Technical Controls

◉ Compliance Controls

Parameters	CYBER SECURITY	INFORMATION SECURITY
Basic Definition	It is the practice of protecting the data from outside the resource on the internet.	It is all about protecting information from unauthorized users, access, and data modification or removal in order to provide confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
Protect	It is about the ability to protect the use of cyberspace from cyber attacks.	It deals with the protection of data from any form of threat.
Scope	Cybersecurity to protect anything in the cyber realm.	Information security is for information irrespective of the realm.
Threat	Cybersecurity deals with the danger in cyberspace.	Information security deals with the protection of data from any form of threat.
Attacks	Cybersecurity strikes against Cyber crimes, cyber frauds, and law enforcement.	Information security strikes against unauthorized access, disclosure modification, and disruption.
Professionals	Cyber security professionals deal with the prevention of active threats or Advanced Persistent threats (APT).	Information security professionals are the foundation of data security and security professionals associated with it are responsible for policies, processes, and organizational roles and responsibilities that assure confidentiality, integrity, and availability.
Deals with	It deals with threats that may or may not exist in the cyber realm such as protecting your social media account, personal information, etc.	It deals with information Assets and integrity, confidentiality, and availability.
Defense	Acts as first line of defense.	Comes into play when security is breached.

Diagrams are given below to represent the difference between Information Security and Cybersecurity. 

In the above diagram, ICT refers to Information and communications technology (ICT) which is an extensional term for information technology (IT) that defines the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunications (basically digital communication security).

Source: geeksforgeeks.org

Continue reading

Cybersecurity vs Network Security vs Information Security

The security of a computer network is a crucial task. It is a process of ensuring confidentiality and integrity. A system is said to be secure if its resources are used and accessed as intended under all the circumstances, but no system can guarantee absolute security from several of various malicious threats and unauthorized access.

In this article, we will see the difference between Cybersecurity vs Network Security vs Information Security.

Cyber Security:

Cybersecurity is the method of protecting systems, networks, and programs from digital attacks. Cybersecurity involves techniques that help and secure various digital components Networks, data, and computer systems from Unauthorized digital access. There are multiple ways to implement cyber security depending on the kind of network you are connected to and the type of cyber-attacks you are prone to. Common Cyber Security Risks:

◉ Social engineering

◉ Brute force

◉ Baiting

◉ Ransomware

Network Security:

Network Security is the method of protecting the usability and integrity of your network and data. It includes both hardware and software terminologies. Effective network security manages access to the network. It targets a variety of threats and stops them from entering or spreading on your network. Common Network Security Risks:

◉ Viruses, worms, and trojans

◉ Denial of Service (DOS) attack

◉ Zero-day attacks

Information Security:

Information security is the measures taken to protect the records from unauthorized entry and use. It gives confidentiality, integrity, and availability. Information Security is the superset that contains cyber security and network safety. it is vital for any enterprise or firm that works on a large scale. data can be electronic or physical. Common Information Security Risks:

◉ Access 

◉ Destruction

◉ Availability

Difference Between Cyber Security, Network Security, and Information Security:

Cyber Security	Network Security	Information Security
Cybersecurity is the method of protecting systems, networks, and programs from digital attacks.	Network Security is the method of protecting the usability and integrity of your network and data.	Information security is the measures taken to protect the records from unauthorized entry and use.
Cyber Security is a subpart of Information Security.	Network Security is a subpart of Cyber Security.	Cyber Security & Network Security comes under Information Security.
It protects anything in the cyber area.	It protects anything in the network area.	Information security is for information irrespective of the space.
It deals with protection from cyber attacks.	It deals with protection from DOS (Denial of Service) attacks.	It deals with the security of data from any kind of threat.
Cyber security attacks against cybercrime and cyber fraud.	Network Security attacks against trojans.	Information Security attacks against unauthorized access, disclosure modification, and disruption.
Cyber security ensures the security of the entire digital data.	Network security only ensures the security of transit data.	Information security ensures the protection of transit and digital data.
It deals with the security of the data resting.	It secures data traveling across the network by terminals.	It gives integrity, confidentiality, and availability.
Common Cyber Security Risks: ◉ Social engineering ◉ Brute force ◉ Baiting ◉ Ransomware	Common Network Security Risks: ◉ Viruses, worms, and trojans ◉ Denial of Service (DOS) attack ◉ Zero-day attacks	Common Information Security Risks: ◉ Access ◉ Destruction ◉ Availability

Source: geeksforgeeks.org

Continue reading

Information Security and Cyber Laws

A Virtual Organization is such type of organization whose members are geographically separated and usually work by computer e-mail and software system while appearing to others to be a single, combined organization with a real physical location.

Virtual Organization is defined as being closely integrated ambitious with its suppliers and downstream with its customers. In the virtual organization, each discrete firm keeps supremacy in major budgeting and pricing matters and functions as part of a greater organization coordinated by the central firm acting as combiner of the actions done by the various partners. Interdependent among partners differentiates the virtual organization from the conventional hierarchy.

Read More: EC-Council Certified Chief Information Security Officer (CCISO)

Companies adept to coordinating and maximizing the capabilities of suppliers will gain more control over key elements of time-from overall order-to-shipment lead time to product-specific cycle time. In addition, full-fledged alliances that tap the resources of multiple parties will effectively slash product-or- process-development time.

◉ Virtual organization is a energetic collection of individuals and institutions which are required to share resources to obtain specified targets.

◉ Virtual organization is a network of independent organizations that combine together for production of a service or product.

◉ Virtual organizations are also mentioned as network organizations, organic networks, hybrid arrangements and value-adding partnerships. This phenomenon has been driven by the effort to achieve greater effectiveness and responsiveness in an extremely competitive environment marked by increasing globalization, technological change and customer demands.

Virtual Organization Properties:

1. Delocalization:

Delocalization is one of the most important developments in the globalization process. It is potentially space dependence. Therefore, enterprises become independent off space and capacity. It eliminates the need for a particular space.

2. Temporalization:

This property deals with the inter-organizational connections and with the internal process organization, in the sense of the standard and pattern organization. The interdependence is described in the life cycle stages of an virtual organization as a circular process of creation, operation, evaluation, and dissolution.

3. Dematerialization:

Dematerialization has the virtual forms in products, communities, services, and so on along the development of the virtualization. With increasing virtualization products become potential immaterial. It means that all object areas are immaterial. Existing correlative confidence for members, lack of physical credits and executives can affect system performance and flexibility.

4. Individualization:

The main reason for this property is increasing consumer demands. One of ways for encapsulating market is to handle to mass production along with personal requirements. Mass customization is one of the way for producers to fulfill customer demands and grave new markets.

5. Non-Institutionalization:

Because operations are performed in a virtual environment without physical attributes, institutionalization of inter-organizational relationships in such environments can be waived.

6. Asynchronization:

This attribute causes members to asynchronously communicate and interact with each other via the ICT in the context of innovations with the release of time. Some companies globally plan their works in three shifts between spread locations.

7. Integrative Atomization:

This property refers to integrate all atomized core competencies of the participants for satisfying customer.

Characteristics of a Virtual Organization:

◉ Virtual organization does not have a corporeal presence but subsits electronically (virtually) on the Internet.

◉ Virtual organization is not constrained by the legal definition of a company.

◉ Virtual organization is formed in an informal manner as an association of independent legal entities.

◉ Principal of synergy (many–to-one). Virtual organization displays a combined property because it is composed from different organizational entities that produce an effect of a single organization.

◉ Principle of divergence (one-to-many). A single organization can display multiplication property by engaging in many virtual organizations at the same time.

◉ Partners in virtual organizations share risks, costs and rewards in search of a global market. The common characteristics of these opportunities, worlds-class core competence, information networks, and interdependent relationships.

◉ Dynamic virtual organizations have a capability to unite quickly.

Virtual Organization Life Cycle:

1. Virtual Organization Creation

2. Virtual Organization Operation

3. Virtual Organization Evolution

4. Virtual Organization Dissolution

Benefits of Virtual Organization:

◉ Virtual organizations make it possible to convince repeatedly changing customer and market needs in a competitive way.

◉ With the help of virtual organizations, it becomes possible to provide services exactly customized to a specific customer need.

◉ Virtual organizations provide ability to participate in the total service range a company can offer to its customers.

◉ Participation in virtual organization enlarges the total number of end-customers a company can extend indirectly via its partners.

◉ By joining in a virtual organization the concept-to-cash time is minimized.

Drawbacks of Virtual Organization:

◉ Each party has its own strategy on access control and conditions of use.

◉ Virtual organization parties require to build trust between them on a peer-to-peer basis.

◉ The assignment of resources is often dynamic since the structure of virtual organizations may change dynamically. This implies that the virtual organization beginner may not know a priority that additional resources may be required.

◉ Members of virtual organization may be located in different countries under different authorities and, as a result, stick on to different legal and business requirements.

◉ There must be mutual trust in security system by all partners involved in virtual organization. This leads to the challenge to come up with an successful and pliable security system.

◉ Privacy and probity at a virtual organization level have to be assured. At the same time parties have to yield access to their services and resources as mentioned in agreements.

Source: geeksforgeeks.org

Continue reading

Cyber Forensics

Cyber forensics is a process of extracting data as proof for a crime (that involves electronic devices) while following proper investigation rules to nab the culprit by presenting the evidence to the court. Cyber forensics is also known as computer forensics. The main aim of cyber forensics is to maintain the thread of evidence and documentation to find out who did the crime digitally. Cyber forensics can do the following:

◉ It can recover deleted files, chat logs, emails, etc

◉ It can also get deleted SMS, Phone calls.

◉ It can get recorded audio of phone conversations.

◉ It can determine which user used which system and for how much time.

◉ It can identify which user ran which program.

Why is cyber forensics important?

In todays technology driven generation, the importance of cyber forensics is immense. Technology combined with forensic forensics paves the way for quicker investigations and accurate results. Below are the points depicting the importance of cyber forensics:

◉ Cyber forensics helps in collecting important digital evidence to trace the criminal.

◉ Electronic equipment stores massive amounts of data that a normal person fails to see. For example: in a smart house, for every word we speak, actions performed by smart devices, collect huge data which is crucial in cyber forensics.

◉ It is also helpful for innocent people to prove their innocence via the evidence collected online.

◉ It is not only used to solve digital crimes but also used to solve real-world crimes like theft cases, murder, etc.

◉ Businesses are equally benefitted from cyber forensics in tracking system breaches and finding the attackers.

How did Cyber Forensics Experts work?

Cyber forensics is a field that follows certain procedures to find the evidence to reach conclusions after proper investigation of matters. The procedures that cyber forensic experts follow are:

◉ Identification: The first step of cyber forensics experts are to identify what evidence is present, where it is stored, and in which format it is stored.

◉ Preservation: After identifying the data the next step is to safely preserve the data and not allow other people to use that device so that no one can tamper data.

◉ Analysis: After getting the data, the next step is to analyze the data or system. Here the expert recovers the deleted files and verifies the recovered data and finds the evidence that the criminal tried to erase by deleting secret files. This process might take several iterations to reach the final conclusion.

◉ Documentation: Now after analyzing data a record is created. This record contains all the recovered and available(not deleted) data which helps in recreating the crime scene and reviewing it.

◉ Presentation: This is the final step in which the analyzed data is presented in front of the court to solve cases.

Types of computer forensics

There are multiple types of computer forensics depending on the field in which digital investigation is needed. The fields are:

◉ Network forensics: This involves monitoring and analyzing the network traffic to and from the criminal’s network. The tools used here are network intrusion detection systems and other automated tools.

◉ Email forensics: In this type of forensics, the experts check the email of the criminal and recover deleted email threads to extract out crucial information related to the case.

◉ Malware forensics: This branch of forensics involves hacking related crimes. Here, the forensics expert examines the malware, trojans to identify the hacker involved behind this.

◉ Memory forensics: This branch of forensics deals with collecting data from the memory(like cache, RAM, etc.) in raw and then retrieve information from that data.

◉ Mobile Phone forensics: This branch of forensics generally deals with mobile phones. They examine and analyze data from the mobile phone.

◉ Database forensics: This branch of forensics examines and analyzes the data from databases and their related metadata.

◉ Disk forensics: This branch of forensics extracts data from storage media by searching modified,  active, or deleted files.

Techniques that cyber forensic investigators use

Cyber forensic investigators use various techniques and tools to examine the data and some of the commonly used techniques are:

◉ Reverse steganography: Steganography is a method of hiding important data inside the digital file, image, etc. So, cyber forensic experts do reverse steganography to analyze the data and find a relation with the case.

◉ Stochastic forensics: In Stochastic forensics, the experts analyze and reconstruct digital activity without using digital artifacts. Here, artifacts mean unintended alterations of data that occur from digital processes.

◉ Cross-drive analysis: In this process, the information found on multiple computer drives is correlated and cross-references to analyze and preserve information that is relevant to the investigation.

◉ Live analysis: In this technique, the computer of criminals is analyzed from within the OS in running mode. It aims at the volatile data of RAM to get some valuable information.

◉ Deleted file recovery: This includes searching for memory to find fragments of a partially deleted file in order to recover it for evidence purposes.

Advantages

◉ Cyber forensics ensures the integrity of the computer.

◉ Through cyber forensics, many people, companies, etc get to know about such crimes, thus taking proper measures to avoid them.

◉ Cyber forensics find evidence from digital devices and then present them in court, which can lead to the punishment of the culprit.

◉ They efficiently track down the culprit anywhere in the world.

◉ They help people or organizations to protect their money and time.

◉ The relevant data can be made trending and be used in making the public aware of it.

What are the required set of skills needed to be a cyber forensic expert?

The following skills are required to be a cyber forensic expert: 

◉ As we know, cyber forensic based on technology. So, knowledge of various technologies, computers, mobile phones, network hacks, security breaches, etc. is required.

◉ The expert should be very attentive while examining a large amount of data to identify proof/evidence.

◉ The expert must be aware of criminal laws, a criminal investigation, etc.

◉ As we know, over time technology always changes, so the experts must be updated with the latest technology.

◉ Cyber forensic experts must be able to analyse the data, derive conclusions from it and make proper interpretations.

◉ The communication skill of the expert must be good so that while presenting evidence in front of the court, everyone understands each detail with clarity.

◉ The expert must have strong knowledge of basic cyber security.

Source: geeksforgeeks.org

Continue reading