Technological Advancements, Data and Information Security - Research Paper Example

In dealing with these challenges, business organizations always struggle with how to defend their intellectual property by minimizing the costs and harm to brands that can result from unintended exposure of employee and customer data (Penton Media, Inc., 2012).

Additionally, data and information security have come on top of the list of the main issues that are being faced by information systems executives nowadays. In this scenario, numerous aspects and factors cause serious issues to data and information security. Some of the important aspects that can create serious security issues can include illegal access to a computer or network, storage room, destruction due to fire, flood, earthquake, and hurricane. At the present, a large number of researches are being carried out to determine the ways and suggest solutions to make organizational data information more secure. It is essential to deal with these issues as they can cause customer dissatisfaction or even whole business failure (Loch & Carr, 1992; Penton Media, Inc., 2012; Shulman, 2006). This report presents an analysis of the potential threats to the data and also suggests solutions for them.

One of the major security issues that can cause a serious challenge for data security is excessive privilege abuse. When database or application users are provided access to databases with privileges that go beyond the needs of their working job purpose, in this scenario, these privileges can be used for carrying out illegal tasks. In addition, a given data user ends up with extreme privileges for the simple cause that database administrators do not have the time to describe as well as update rough access privilege control methods for every user (Shulman, 2006).
This problem can be resolved by using various techniques. One of the basic techniques is a username and password-based access. Though it is easy to use in many cases, users forget their passwords, and these passwords are accessed by illegal users. Another solution to deal with this problem is the implementation of effective security measures against the excessive privileges that are established through query-level access control. In this scenario, the query-level access control mechanism will limit database rights to minimum necessary SQL processes (UPDATE, SELECT, etc.) and data. In addition, the granularity of database access control has to expand beyond the table to specific rows of columns in a table (Shulman, 2006).

Another major threat is backup data exposure. This is another most important data security problem that is based on the backup database storage media that is completely unprotected from attack. As an effect, several high-profile and data-related security breaches can happen and any person can illegally access the database backup tapes and hard disks (Ponemon, 2007).
Though username and password-based technique can be used to deal with this issue it is not as much effective (as discussed above). To deal with this issue all data backups have to be encrypted. At the present, there are numerous encryption techniques available. Some of the well-known techniques that can be used for this purpose include public key cryptography and hashing. These techniques are very effective in protecting the data (Ponemon, 2007).

There is another most important issue that can damage the data and information stored in a computer and that is a computer virus. A computer virus is a program that spreads from one file to another so it can be very dangerous for a business. In this way, it can infect all the data and information stored in the computer (Norton, 2001; Shelly, Cashman, & Vermaat, 2005; Turban, Leidner, McLean, & Wetherbe, 2005).

The best solution to this problem is the use of an antivirus program. There are many antivirus software applications available to stop these viruses from entering a system. For instance, Norton antivirus is considered to be an appropriate solution. Additionally, it is believed that care is better than cure so it is essential for businesses and individuals that they regularly update their antivirus programs to fight the latest emerging viruses. An antivirus program stops and removes the viruses entering the system but it must be upgraded regularly. If you do not update the definitions of an antivirus regularly then it will be useless. A firewall can also be effective in dealing with these kinds of issues. But it is not effective for all viruses and threats (Norton, 2001; Shelly, Cashman, & Vermaat, 2005; Turban, Leidner, McLean, & Wetherbe, 2005). Read More