A Beginner’s Guide to Network Security
The Internet has undoubtedly become the largest publicdata network, enabling and facilitating both personal and business communications worldwide. The volume of traffic moving over the Internet, as well as corporate networks, is expanding exponentially every day. More and more communication is taking place via e-mail; mobile workers, telecommuters, and branch offices are using the Internet to remotely connect to their corporate networks; and commercial transactions completed over the Internet, via the World Wide Web, now account for large portions of corporate revenue.
While the Internet has transformed and greatly improved the way we do business, this vast network and its associated technologies have opened the door to an increasing number of security threats from which corporations must protect themselves. Although network attacks are presumably more serious when they are inflicted upon businesses that store sensitive data, such as personal medical or financial records, the consequences of attacks on any entity range from mildly inconvenient to completely debilitating—important data can be lost, privacy can be violated, and several hours, or even days, of network downtime can ensue.
Despite the costly risks of potential security breaches, the Internet can be one of the safest means by which to conduct business. For example, giving credit card information to a telemarketer over the phone or a waiter in a restaurant can be more risky than submitting the information via a Web site, because electronic commerce transactions are usually protected by security technology. Waiters and telemarketers are not always monitored or trustworthy. Yet the fear of security problems can be just as harmful to businesses as actual security breaches. General fear and suspicion of computers still exists and with that comes a distrust of the Internet. This distrust can limit the business opportunities for companies, especially those that are completely Web based. Thus, companies must enact security policies and instate safeguards that not only are effective, but are also perceived as effective. Organizations must be able to adequately communicate how they plan to protect their customers.
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