INFORMATION SECURITY

Information Security in the Business Corporate



Information Security in the Business Corporate

Abstract

Information is the key resource of business corporate, as it relies on the information for the execution of all business process. Over the past few decades, majority of the business corporate have started deploying information technology for efficient storage and management of their business information. The advanced tools of technology benefit the business world by providing effective means of information management, but at the same time, these technological tools pose information security risks on the business corporate. This paper discusses the major security issues in the business corporate, and the methodologies which can be used to prevent these risks.

Introduction

Information security refers to the process of protecting the information and information resources of an organization (ISO, 2012). This process involves the activities of developing, implementing and managing the software and hardware infrastructure, for assuring the individual and organization's information privacy and security.

In today's advanced world, information has become the key resource for the business organizations, as well as for society. As the technology is getting advanced day by day, the threats to information security grow more. The main information security risks for the corporate arise, due to activities such as data theft and corruption, hacking efforts, social engineering and phishing attacks. In addition to these unethical attempts of breaching security, the corporate information is always prone to the risks caused by natural hazards, such as fire and flood.

The business corporate mainly relies on the data for all its activities. As the dependence of the businesses on information systems have increased drastically, so do the threats to information security. Nowadays, business data is highly vulnerable to threats from the hackers and competitors of the organization. Hence, the deployment of efficient information security mechanisms has become the major challenge for business corporate.

Information security values most for decision making processes of the company, as the accurate and updated information will help managers and executives to take the best decisions in favor of the organization depending upon the current information, whereas the faulty or corrupt information will lead the organization to wrong decisions.

The business corporations must be able to handle and manage their information securely, for which they need to deploy efficient information security infra structure. This infrastructure must provide some major functionality to business corporate. These functionalities include, streamlining the security mechanisms with the business processes, mitigate the risks of external hackers and intruders, enhance business productivity, and reduce the cost which the corporate could face as a result of the data loss or system's crash.

The next sections of the paper discuss few major threats to information security, and strategies the business corporate should follow for maintaining the information security.

Trends Causing Information Security Threats

Over the past few decades, various trends have been considered as responsible for causing serious information security risks for business corporate. In this section of the paper, we discuss few of such trends.

Distributed computing

The computers are now used by almost every one. Few decades ago, the use of computers and ...