Essay: Information Centric Security

Sample Essay

Words 1,320

Another trend in modern day businesses is for corporations to share sensitive information with other entities, giving clients, suppliers and consultants etc. access to their databases or for business competitors to share data with one another. This practice, while it may lead to better quality services and reductions in costs, results in great problems in terms of security (Axelrod, Axelrod, Bayuk, & Schutzer, 2009).

In addition the whole task of network security may have been outsourced oversees. Oversees outsourcing of security is a relatively new and untested security solution which has yielded varying results for people (Hill, 2009).

In most organizations of today, wireless networking takes place. Wireless links follow mostly one of two systems; Wireless LAN or 802.11 standard connections (Karl & Willig, 2007).

In a wired network eavesdropping is not much of an issue; however in wireless networks, since the transmission of the signal airwaves between two computers that are connected with wireless networking, takes place over the enforcing strict security is very difficult in these networks. An unsecured wireless network would allow anyone to join in. Unsecured networks make it easy for malevolent individuals to break into networks and eavesdrop upon communications. Secure wireless connections in use today, mostly follow one of two security standards. These standards are the Wired Equivalent Privacy (WEP) standard and the Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) standard (Karl & Willig, 2007).

The WEP uses a stream cipher RC4 for the purpose of ensuring that communications remain confidential. In addition in includes a CRC-32 checksum to ensure the integrity of data (Karl & Willig, 2007).

However, WEP was identified early on as having major security problems. It was revealed that experienced and skilled hackers could intercept and crack its packets in minutes. That is why WEP was declared obsolete by the Wi-Fi Alliance; however in many organizations, it continues to be used today (Karl & Willig, 2007).

Wi-Fi Protected Access (WPA) replaced WEP as the standard of choice. WPA improved upon the weak data encryption standards of the WEP and in addition it added a new enhanced user authentication standard. These new improvements were implemented in the form of TKIP and 802.11x mechanisms, which allow the encryption keys in a network to be changed at a much faster rate then the rate at which hackers are able to intercept and decrypt them (Karl & Willig, 2007).

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