We’ve all heard of the term, but most of us haven’t bothered with the definition. In this article, we discuss cybersecurity at its vaguest, glossing over what cybersecurity is and how it is of utmost importance; be it for a single computer or a whole corporation.
Cybersecurity is usually a set of techniques or controls that are put into practice to protect systems, programs and unity of networks from unauthorised access.
At its core, information and systems are protected from cyber threats by cybersecurity as cyber attacks can cause a substantial financial, economic, and reputational damage.
An estimate has been brought up by the UK government citing that large-scale businesses are set back by nearly £20000 from a single breach in cybersecurity. While companies of such scales have an acute awareness of the possible cyber threats they could face, 45% of small-scale businesses believe they are not serious targets.
It does not matter. As long as you’re connected to the internet, you’re at risk. These risks can be of many types such as malware, phishing, and exploits kits. Cyberterrorism, warfare and espionage are a part of what cybersecurity deals with.
National level security is also of need as the US, followed by other nations, has conceded the fifth kind of warfare, namely cyberwarfare. Cyberwarfare focuses on recovering data rather than shutting a network down as hackers attempt to disrupt communication lines and commerce.
But in today’s day and age, methods to attack a system have become sophisticated and inexpensive, and as a result, cybersecurity has found itself in a race to keep up with various strategies to counteract said attacks with. However, cybersecurity developers often find themselves retaining a part of their code as proprietary which creates a technology gap. These gaps are later exploited by hackers to gain information.
Even identities have come under assault. Cyber espionage, or the practice of obtaining information without the owners’ regard, is often conducted via malware.
An attack can be prevented by a great many number of ways. But securing a system with only one layer is extremely dangerous. That is why to ensure an attack is blocked completely, these are layered one after the other. This method, however, is extortionate.
The layers of security having being placed still doesn’t ensure safety as massive data leaks have occurred over the years. This is the reason why board members of mega-million enterprises have decided to prioritise and fund cybersecurity.
A topic of vastness such as this can never be thoroughly discussed, as hackers and cybersecurity developers bring creative methods alike to outdo the other.