COMPUTER SECURITY
Computer security is the protection of the items you value, called the assets of a computer or computer system. There are many types of assets, involving hardware, software, data, people, processes, or combinations of these. To determine what to protect, we must first identify what has value and to whom.
A computer device (including hardware, added components, and accessories) is certainly an asset. Because most computer hardware is pretty useless without programs, the software is also an asset. Software includes the operating system, utilities and device handlers; applications such as word processing, media players or email handlers; and even programs that you may have written yourself. Much hardware and software is offthe-shelf, meaning that it is commercially available (not custom-made for your purpose) and that you can easily get a replacement. The thing that makes your computer unique and important to you is its content: photos, tunes, papers, email messages, projects, calendar information, books (with your annotations), contact information, code you created, and the like. Thus, data items on a computer are assets, too. Unlike most hardware and software, data can be hard—if not impossible—to recreate or replace. These assets are all shown in Figure 1-2.
These three things—hardware, software, and data—contain or express things like the design for your next new product, the photos from your recent vacation, the chapters of your new book, or the genome sequence resulting from your recent research. All of these things represent intellectual endeavor or property, and they have value that differs from one person or organization to another. It is that value that makes them assets worthy of protection, and they are the elements we want to protect. Other assets—such as access to data, quality of service, processes, human users, and network connectivity—deserve protection, too; they are affected or enabled by the hardware, software, and data. So in most cases, protecting hardware, software, and data covers these other assets as well.
In this information, unless we specifically distinguish between hardware, software, and data, we refer to all these assets as the computer system, or sometimes as the computer. And because processors are embedded in so many devices, we also need to think about such variations as mobile phones, implanted pacemakers, heating controllers, and automobiles. Even if the primary purpose of the device is not computing, the device’s embedded computer can be involved in security incidents and represents an asset worthy of protection.
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| FIGURE 1-2 Computer Objects of Value |
• Computer
• Devices (disk drives, memory, printer)
• Network gear
Software:
• Operating system
• Utilities (antivirus)
• Commercial applications (word processing, photo editing)
• Individual applications
Data:
• Documents
• Photos
• Music, videos
• Class projects
