As the world is moving digital at an exceptionally fast pace, this let every activity of business, education and entertainment to be digitized and enhances the chances of being attacked and exposed by cyber criminals.  data flows freely across various devices and we demand easy online document sharing, email that’s available on every device, databases accessible from anywhere but what if the channel from where you are transmitting your data is exposed, or your network is being compromised. There comes the cyber security practices to protect us from these situations

What is Cyber Security?

Cyber security is a practice that lies under information security, which protects and defends an organization’s digital device, networks and data that are vulnerable to unauthorized access, attacks and damages.

Implementing effective cyber defense programs are mandatory to giving the individuals and organizations the right security tools needed to protect themselves from cyberattacks like phishing, ransomware, malware and social engineering attacks.

Cyber Security Practice

The main goal of cyber security is to achieve CIA, a model designed to guide policies for cyber security within an organization:

1. Confidentiality: Protection against unauthorized access. It includes the set of rules that limits access to data.
2. Integrity: Protection from modification and alteration of data. It is the assurance that the data is trustworthy.
3. Availability: Protecting the means of accessing the data. It is a guarantee of reliable access to the data by authorized people.

Securing Assets and Mitigating Risks

Cyber security is all about securing assets in a cyber world. These assets could be any digital devices or data that possess some loop holes and vulnerabilities. The practice of identifying these vulnerabilities that may negatively impact an organization’s assets is said to be Risk Assessment. There are five steps to perform Risk assessment:

1. Finding the hazards. At first, we need to understand the difference between a hazard and a risk. A hazard is something that possesses some possibilities to be harmed whereas a risk is the likelihood of that harm being realized.
2. Identify the number of hazards to understand who might be harmed and how, such as the devices under premises of an organization and the means to communicate with these devices
3. Estimate the risks and resolve on control measures after identifying the hazards and determining who might be harmed and how, this results in protecting the assets from threats
4. Analyze your findings and document them to implement. Your findings should be written down as it’s a legal requirement where there are 5 or more employees. By documenting it after recording the findings, it indicates that you have identified the hazards, decided who could be harmed and how, and also shows how you plan to eliminate the risks and hazards.
5. Review your assessment and update. This step is necessary as the security policies of an organization changes time to time and this would affect the existing findings

Some Prerequisite Security Measures

1. Employee awareness

Human error is the significant cause of data breaches, so you need to train your employees with the knowledge to deal with the threats.
Training courses will acknowledge how security threats and data breaches would affect them. This will also assist to put on best practice of avoiding these situations.

2. Application Security

Web application security is important to any business.  Loopholes and vulnerabilities present in applications are main target to intruders to expose any system.
As application security has a critical role in business, it is important to focus on web application security.

3. Network Security

Network security is the means of protecting the usability and integrity of your data. This is accomplished by conducting a network penetration test, which scans your network for vulnerabilities and security issues.

4. Leadership commitment

Leadership commitment is the key to cyber resilience. Without it, it is very challenging to establish and enforce effective processes. Top management must be ready to invest in appropriate cyber security resources, such as awareness training.

5. Password management

Password management is the set of principles to prevent users from an unauthorized access. It is recommended to deploy strong policy that provides guidance to make sure a user is creating a strong password.

Cyber Security Top Certifications

These mentioned certifications are great choice to consider if a person wants to pursue a career path in cyber security:

1. Certified Information Systems Security Professional – CISSP
2. Certified Ethical Hacker – CEH
3. Certified Information Security Manager – CISM
4. CompTIA Security+
5. Offensive Security Certified Professional – OSCP
6. Certified Cloud Security Professional – CCSP
7. Computer Hacking Forensic Investigator (CHFI)
8. Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) Security