• Every year, we are witnessing over 800,000 attacks!
  • 2,200 cyber-attacks are recorded each day!
  • Every 39 seconds, a cyber-attack occurs!

I guess these statistics are no surprise to us. There are much more shocking incidents we hear daily about cyber-attacks. Today, it's highly important to stay updated with current security trends to save yourself from great losses.

That's why we believe you should be aware of some important components of cybersecurity to get a better understanding. These cybersecurity components are some areas to ensure that your online life is secure and safe.

So, let's get started!

Components of Cybersecurity:- 

1. Application Security

AppSec or Application security is the improvement of security strategies or practices that offer a secure software development process. It is implemented to protect software applications from security threats and vulnerabilities.

As most of the applications are directly connected to the internet and cloud, the bad actors find them an easy target. There are many cyber threats, such as injection, broken authentication, misconfiguration, and cross-site scripting, which can truly harm the whole app structure.

But with application security, all these threats can be stopped. Not only that, it also helps to protect the application from bot attacks and malicious interactions.

Authentication, data encryption, input validation, logging, session management, code review, and penetration testing are some common examples of app security.

2. Network Security

In network security, our main focus is to implement security measures to protect the integrity, confidentiality, and availability of computer or system networks and data. It prevents unauthorized access, data breaches, and disruptions to network services, applications, data, user information, and location.

One of the most popular examples of network security is a firewall. They act as your system's first line of defense by intense monitoring and controlling the incoming and outgoing traffic according to the determined security rules.

They create a strong barrier between a trusted internal party and untrusted external networks, preventing unauthorized access and potential cyber-attacks.

Similarly, network segmentation, access control, VPN, zero trust (ZTNA), data loss prevention, sandboxing, and intrusion prevention systems are some practices under networks. It works to protect our hardware and software against viruses, worms, trojans, spyware, adware, and ransomware.

3. Information Security

Information security simply refers to the security of information in the way it is processed, stored, and transmitted. It helps us to save our data and information from unauthorized access, destruction, modification, and misuse.

The information could be of anything. It can be personal information shared on social profiles, financial on payment apps, biometrics, etc.

Commonly, the goal of information security revolves around confidentiality, integrity, and availability (CIA).

  • Confidentiality—It deals with the information that's supposed to be kept hidden and only accessible to you. It can be your password, security code, transaction pin, etc.
  • Integrity— It refers to the maintenance of data. It means no one should be able to edit or modify the data without any certain authorized permission.
  • Availability— It simply means to make data available when it is required.

The information's CIA can be breached via some cyber-attacks such as DDoS, malware, phishing, and ransomware. However, many information security tools such as IAM, network security monitoring, penetration testing, encryption, firewalls, IDPS, and anti-malware do a great job against them.

4. Operational Security

In operational security, we keep a bird's eye on all the security and treat measures to ensure everything is working well and the whole environment is safe. Here, we think like hackers and cyber criminals to test the system and find out the potential area that's weak for attacks.

Afterward, we work to enhance the security layers of the network by double control, task automation, minimum or limited access, and change management processes.

5. End-user Security

End-user security protects individuals or end-users from various cybersecurity threats and risks. It involves safeguarding the information, devices, and systems that end-users interact with in their daily digital activities.

Targeting users and making them fool is quite easy for criminals, as phishing is the cause of 91% of cyberattacks. So, it's important to educate the users about the threats or scams online. We can make use of social media, text messaging, emails, antivirus app downloads, and strong password suggestions.

For more security hygiene, we should focus on other practices such as keeping updated devices, DNS filtering, Firmware protection, Passcode-protected screen locks, and so on.

6. Disaster Recovery Planning

Disaster recovery planning is like an emergency kit for your system after a cyber incident or during danger. Here, we include the processes that are designed to recover the data and information of any organization after getting their system hacked.

A thorough BIA has been conducted to determine the critical functions, systems, and processes that are essential for the organization's operations. After that, we prioritize the recovery of critical systems, applications, and data based on the BIA.

During the recovery planning, some things are crucial to do, such as:

  • Implementing regular and automated backup processes
  • Storing backups in geographically diverse locations to avoid the risk of data loss due to a localized event.
  • Establishing clear RTO and RPO objectives for each critical system. RTO defines the acceptable time for restoring operations, while RPO defines the acceptable and tolerable amount of data loss in the recovery process.
  • Implement redundancy and failover mechanisms for critical infrastructure or cybersecurity components, such as servers, networks, and data centers, to minimize downtime.
  • Establish relationships with key vendors and service providers to ensure their cooperation in the event of a disaster.
  • Regularly test the disaster recovery plan through simulations and exercises to address any weaknesses of the targeted system.

Bottom Line

All these elements of cybersecurity play an important role in maintaining your data with bulletproof security. So, if you run a business or any organization, you should make sure that all these aspects are completely fulfilled.

Also, be aware of some critical potential risks related to all the data you put online over various platforms.

I hope this blog is helpful to you. Stay cyber-safe!