At the end of the day, the goals are simple: safety and security. — Jodi Rell
Intention of this series is to spread awareness about the cybersecurity, information security, data privacy and other key aspects in order to have secure products or services for everyone in simplified manner.
Secure environment, systems, services or products can be built only if you are aware about unsecure parameters.
Let’s try to relate security with our real life example and check how its related and different from digital security (cybersecurity).
Security is the degree of protection against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security in physical or digital world is important for peace of mind.
SECURING != BLOCKING EVERYTHING
Securing is not equals to blocking everything, what does that meant ?, let’s try to interpret it the other way, Securing is allowing access to authorised entities. Let’s try to understand with few real life examples which we come across everyday.
Example 1 :
In offices we get access only if we prove the identity either by punch cards, biometrics or any other mechanism which is implemented in the premise. So, it conveys that securing the premise is not only about preventing it from unauthorised access but at the same time providing access to the authorised ones after verifying their identity.
It leads to other security aspect known as identity theft which we will be covering in detail in upcoming sessions.
Example 2 :
Airports checkins where the persons with valid identity proof and boarding tickets are allowed to enter the airport and board the flight, this is another good example of securing is not blocking but allowing persons with valid identity. Also, identity may be needed to be proven by passing through various checkpoints like passing entry gate, security gates, boarding gate and then in flight checkin. Similarly, a digital system can have various checkpoints for authorising the identity which can also be referred as multi step or multi factor authentication.
Authentication types and provisioning we will be covering in upcoming sessions in details
Yes, security seems boring sometimes (or often every-time) but we would be trying to make it a fun way by relating it with real world as it helps us understand things easily.
I promise we will conclude this part 1 after last example :)
Securing yourself == securing others
We are living in our houses, apartments, villas. Suppose if any stranger is able to get access to your house then he can possibly steal your money or other important assets, you can get harmed and many other possibilities but if you observe its due to some security glitch by yourself your home was attacked & suffered.
Now, on the contrary when we talk about cyber security, a glitch by single person can not only harm that individual but to the society and can be disruptive to whole world.
So, security glitch in digital world is like a contagious disease.
Security used to be an inconvenience sometimes, but now it’s a necessity all the time. — Martina Navratilova
Feel free to comment your views and suggestions, attempt is to keep things simple and self explanatory to reach larger audience. In coming sessions we will try to go dive into more technical approaches and try to deal with factors we can incorporate in order to make solutions & products more secure. Stay Tuned !!!