Introduction

PALDOM does not claim to have a complete or final answer for the security issues facing all computer users today. What follows is a brief outline of the problem and some of the issues.

Everyone's Problem

Every person in your organization, whether they actually use a computer, analyze printed reports, serve lunch, or clean the offices has a responsibility for your system's security.

Possible Security Breaches

A few of the security breaches possible are:

-External attacks on networks and servers.

-Network intrusion.

-Physical damage, accidental or vandalism

-Data destruction, intentional or caused by mistakes.

-Data theft.

-Fraud

The Risks

Examples of what you may risk if a security breach occurs are:

-Loss of property

-Loss of irreplaceable information

-Operating interruptions causing commercial losses

-Liability for data security to other parties or customers.

Improving Security

While it may seem that the battle is your organization against a world of hackers and exploiters, here are a few things that can be done to improve your system's security:

• Develop written security plans and implement them.

• Train your employees to implement your security plan.

• Improve physical security.

• Establish and actively manage network firewalls

• Establish intrusion prevention and detection procedures.

• Use data and communication encryption where justified.

• Use your router's security features.

• Perform regular system and data backups with off site storage.

• Implement password management programs to use better passwords, change them often, and restrict their dissemination.

• Provide server, data storage and communication redundancy