Cyber Security

The term cyber security denotes a number of activities, measures, and techniques developed to protect from attacks, service interruptions, and other threats to computers, computer networks, and information they contain and exchange, as well as software, data, and other elements of cyberspace. Therefore, this term refers to united efforts and attempts, which include research and analyses, with the aim of inventing new technologies and improving the existing activities related to the security of cyberspace and the level of its protection from cyber threats. Those activities can contain, for example, an estimate of reliability and vulnerability of the hardware and software used in critical infrastructures of a particular country. The concept of cyber security implies a holistic approach in research and confronting cyber threats to information systems—from standpoints of information and mathematic sciences and their special disciplines (like cryptography and cryptanalysis), and military, legal, crime, and criminology aspects.

Etymologically, roots of the term cyber security date back to the 1960s. At that time, communication security (COMSEC) was dealt with. When computers appeared, during the 1970s, computer security (COMPUSEC) came into being. In the 1980s, because of such threats as Cuckoo's Egg and Morris Worm, it was realized that a network consisting of a large number of computers could be used for malicious aims. That is when the integration of communication and computer security happened, so the term information security (INFOSEC) was coined. Information security has integrated disciplines that used to be separated, such as personnel security, computer security, communication security, and operational security. At that point, information security had already become one of the four cornerstones of U.S. national security (besides diplomacy, economy, and military components).