Threat intelligence is information that extends our visibility of threats beyond the edges of our network. Intelligence seeks to collect relevant information wherever it can be found for analyzing and synthesizing it into meaningful knowledge on which we can act.
In today’s cyber threat landscape, intelligence can alert us to new and emerging global threats that may affect our operations. Intelligence can also help us identify vectors targeting organizations or their executives, providing the insights to help & prepare an action plan for combating threats.
Threat intelligence could possibly be a system or a network or a controlled or managed entity. This entity deliberates and possesses the ability to analyze and act upon the unexpected occurrences in a system or a network. It provides complete information about a possible threat based on the environment that is kept under observation for monitoring & detecting the threats.
At times, days or even months can pass before vulnerabilities in the environment are patched, thereby increasing the business risk and expanding the window of exposure. Advanced Threat Intelligence System delivers early warnings and actionable security intelligence enabling the organization to quickly protect against threats and vulnerabilities before they impact the organization. The ATI helps to reduce considerable risk by closing the window of exposure more quickly and also helps to devote more time to quickly remediate the risks most pertinent to the organization.
Significance of Advanced / Global Threat Intelligence
The Advanced Threat Intelligence (ATI) System / Global Threat Intelligence (GTI) System possess the advanced combating technique to analyze and detect sophisticated emerging threats looming...
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...hough hacktivists, cybercriminals and disgruntled persons represent less sophisticated and resourced threats, they still present a significant risk to the enterprise's operations, its brand, executives and employees.
Conclusion
Poised to make an indelible imprint in the security arena, the ATI / GTI system offers a wide gamut of benefits to the organization as explained above. Let every organization have this system in place and reap the rewards by harnessing the cumulative best of this system.
Digital world is dangerous because it is silent. Feeling secured is more dangerous because it makes the organization complacent. Hence, every organization should keep taking measures towards strengthening its security on an ongoing basis. This is possible by moving on to the next security level and embracing the new security techniques. After all, a stitch in time saves nine.
What may have started as a seemingly boring and meaningless computer check up and accounting problem, turned into an investigation and search for a military spy for the KGB. It seems that the more that the technical revolution grows and gets relied on more, the level of security becomes necessary to grow past it. It seems to be an ongoing battle to protect and monitor information from possible threats and hackers.
Intelligence analysts face complex problems, usually involving incomplete and ambiguous information, often under pressing time
The integrated threat theory model consists of four types of threats that can lead to prejudice. These threats are: realistic threats, symbolic threats, intergroup anxiety, and negative stereotypes. Realistic threats are posed by the outgroup and have several types of consequence and impact. They can either be threats of war, threats to political and/or economic power of the ingroup, and threats to physical and/or material well-being of the ingroup and its members. Symbolic threats is usually based on perceived group differences in morals, values, standards, beliefs, and attitudes. Symbolic threats are also threats to the ingroup’s worldview and these threats arise because the ingroup believes that its system of values are morally correct.
The United States has endured numerous security breaches and high security threats over the past two decades. After the attacks on 9/11, the office of Intelligence became a vital source in retrieving sensitive data and tracking down potential terrorists and their networks which could pose a threat to the American people and then forwarding that vital information to the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies. Intelligence became a key role in “assessing threats to critical American infrastructures, bio-and nuclear terrorism, pandemic diseases, threats to the borders to the nation, and radicalization within American society” (Randol, 2009, p. 7). The sharing of homeland security intelligence has become a precedence for Congress and the government. Our nation must be one step ahead of any potential terrorists that want to harm our turf. Within this text the capabilities and limitations of both domestic and foreign intelligence in supporting homeland security efforts will be explained;
Intelligence has come a long way since the time around 1,000 B.C. as Egyptian hieroglyphs have revealed and will only continue to grow far into the future. The Intelligence community (IC) will run into challenges far into the future but over the next several years it will be budgetary restructuring/cuts, cyber security implementation, and preventing the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction because a transitional phase within the United States will impact intelligence operations. The intelligence community is likely to transition back to its pre-9/11 requirements thus hindering or withdrawing post 9/11 implementations and requirements.
Fusion centers are exclusively designed to empower first responders, law enforcement, communities, public and private sectors to be educated and trained to understand the importance of sharing national intelligence. This research will focus on the strength and weakness, how to apprise and manage The Department of Homeland Security,
Homeland security was developed by the United States government to protect the country from external aggression, reduce the likelihood of terrorist attacks and manage the damage that occurs in case of attacks. To this end, the government set up and reconstituted numerous agencies to aid in the fight against terrorism in the United States. The United States Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security constitute the most prominent departments under the United States law to champion the fight against any attacks by extremist groups. Federal, State and local law enforcement agencies, as well as the United States’ military also have a role to play in homeland security. With the increasing cases of attacks and acts of aggression towards the United States, the government sought to strengthen the resolve to curb any attacks aimed at killing or maiming the citizens or destruction of government institutions and installations. In the wake of the September 11 attacks, it was apparent that stringent measures were needed to prevent attacks on American soil and protect the citizens of the country. This paper examines the duties; responsibility and intelligence methods used by the military, federal, State and local law enforcement agencies, as well as homeland security agencies in the fight against terrorism, with the aim of drawing similarities and differences.
Security helps the organization meet its business objectives or mission by protecting its physical and financial resources, reputation, legal position, employees, and other tangible and intangible assets through the selection and application of appropriate safeguards. Businesses should establish roles and responsibilities of all personnel and staff members. However, a Chief Information Officer should be appointed to direct an organization’s day to day management of information assets. Supporting roles are performed by the service providers and include systems operations, whose personnel design and operate the computer systems. Each team member must be held accountable in ensuring all of the rules and policies are being followed, as well as, understanding their roles, responsibilities and functions. Organizations information processing systems are vulnerable to many threats that can inflict various types of damage that can result in significant losses (Harris, 2014). Losses can come from actions from trusted employees that defraud the system, outside hackers, or from careless data entry. The major threat to information protection is error and omissions that data entry personnel, users, system operators and programmers make. To better protect business information resources, organizations should conduct a risk analysis to see what
National security in the United States is extremely important and requires extensive risk management measures including strategic, exercise, operational and capability-based planning, research, development, and making resource decisions in order to address real-world events, maintain safety, security and resilience (Department of Homeland Security [DHS], 2011). The national security and threat assessment process consists of identifying the risk and establishing an objective, analyzing the relative risks and environment, exploring alternatives and devising a plan of action for risk management, decision making and continued monitoring and surveillance (DHS, 2011). Identifying risks entails establishing a context to define the risk, considering related risks and varying scenarios, including the unlikely ones, which then leads to the analysis phase; gathering data and utilizing various methodologies and analysis data software systems to survey incidence rates, relative risks, prevalence rates, likelihood and probable outcomes (DHS, 2011). These two key phases lay the foundation to explore alternatives and devise action plans. Threats, vulnerabilities and consequences (TCV) are also a key component of many national security risk management assessments because it directly relates to safety and operation capabilities, but the text stress that it should not be included in the framework of every assessment because it is not always applicable (DHS, 2011).
As electronic commerce, online business-to-business operations, and global connectivity have become vital components of a successful business strategy, enterprises have adopted security processes and practices to protect information assets. But if you look at today's computing environments, system security is a horrible game of numbers: there are currently over 9,223 publicly released vulnerabilities covering known security holes in a massive range of applications from popular Operating Systems through to obscure and relatively unknown web applications. [01] Over 300 new vulnerabilities are being discovered and released each month. Most companies work diligently to maintain an efficient, effective security policy, implementing the latest products and services to prevent fraud, vandalism, sabotage, and denial of service attacks. But the fact is you have to patch every hole of your system, but an attacker need find only one to get into your environment. Whilst many organisations subscribe to major vendor's security alerts, these are just the tip of the security iceberg and even these are often ignored. For example, the patch for the Code Red worm was available some weeks before the worm was released. [02]
The computer is considered one of the most important technological advances of the twentieth century. Security and privacy issues have been in existence long before the computer became a vital component of organizations' operations. Nevertheless, the operating features of a computer make it a double-edged sword. Computer technologies with reliable error detection and recording capabilities, permit the invasion of a supposedly secure environment to occur on a grand scale and go undetected. Furthermore, computer and communications technology permit the invasion of a persons' privacy and likewise go undetected. Two forces threaten privacy: one, the growth of information technology with its enhanced capacity for surveillance, communication, computation, storage and retrieval and two, the more insidious threat, the increased value of information in decision making. Information has become more vital in the competitive environment, thus, decision makers covet it even if it viol!
National and International Security is a sum of the actions taken by countries and other organizations that can guarantee the safety and well being of their population. It is vital for a nation to pre-emptively discover what issues could affect their security, and take action to prevent any detrimental or harmful events from happening. With the development of technology and the transition into a more technologically savvy society, cyber security has become one of the most prevalent and important economic and national security issues that the United States will come to face.
What value does strategic intelligence provide to national policy and decision makers? Intelligence at all levels to include strategic intelligence is crucial for policy and decision makers. The Intelligence Community (IC) works for the policy and decision makers in ensuring that they have the information necessary to make the appropriate decisions when it comes to national security. The Intelligence Community exists to support the policy-maker. The policy-maker isn’t the analyst his or herself.
Intelligence officers are defined as skilled subject-matter experts who study and evaluate information from many sources. From the information, they develop useable assessments
As we could see in the reading resources there are many useful resources for counselors. It is important to remember that no one tool can be effective for all situations. Risk/threat assessment has to be done carefully to respond appropriately to every unique situation. The guide that we read had a lot of good information in it, but again it is only a guide there is no book with all the right answers. This will be the counselor’s judgment call ultimately and training in this area is definitely needed.