Why is data security so important? After all, shouldn’t most data be stored in secure locations, accessed through a password, and nothing else? Why is it that cybersecurity is its own industry?
The answer is simple. Data is so valuable it can be considered one of the most crucial currencies today. Data itself can mean anything, from a name handwritten on a paper to an extensive database of all citizens in a nation. For this piece, data will be described as anything stored on hardware or in the cloud through digital solutions.
Data defines trends. It is the most valuable asset of any social media firm or marketing agency. Advertisements run based on data gathered over time, determining the overall direction an organization takes. Companies assess their production focus by looking at buying cycles, product demand, mentions of a specific product on social media, and more. Websites can be improved and run on data, which shows how many users visited which page and how long. All this is done through data analysis and statistical information, commonly known as data science, and security firms should both protect and integrate such assets into cybersecurity itself.
One of the most important advantages is that data can protect against common security threats, such as spam and phishing. Phishing is one an individual or entity poses as a different, legitimate institution and lures unsuspecting victims into providing personal information or sensitive credentials. As globalization increases, online-only businesses increase as well, which means that phishing will most likely increase. Phishing attacks can target – and successfully steal – billions of dollars’ worth of data, and creating datasets for insights on how to prevent such attacks can be beneficial to cybersecurity overall. Spam is similarly common and can be a security threat. For particular highly popular product launches, spammers are often present to continuously barrage the product website with requests, which puts the servers under heavy load and can lead to a crash or other vulnerabilities. Data science can determine when to protect against such spamming attacks as well.
In conclusion, as the value of data increases, data science and its benefits to cybersecurity increase as well. Intrusion Detection Systems (IDS) and Intrusion Prevention Systems (IPS) can utilize machine learning algorithms to detect and determine attack vectors and apply appropriate security measures.
