The document discusses hardware security, emphasizing the importance of protecting computer hardware from damage, theft, and environmental hazards. It outlines several security measures including regular maintenance, insurance, dust elimination, fire protection, and the use of air conditioning and power protection devices. Additionally, it covers information security practices, data protection methods, and identifies various security threats such as unauthorized access, viruses, and malware.

2. Computer Security
Chapter 4

3. Hardware Security
 The protection of computer hardware from being damaged or lost due
to accidental or intentional harm and to keep hardware in good
condition is called hardware security.
 Computer is made of electronic boards, chips, electromagnetic devices
like hard disk, electromechanical parts like CPU Fan, DVD-Drive
motors etc.
The hardware can be damaged by:
 dust dirt on mechanical parts
 water and moisture on the electronic circuits
 irregular electricity on the circuit boards
 overheating of the device
 fire burning the machine
 theft of the computer and its devices

4. Hardware Security Measures
Some common hardware security measures are as follows:
1. ID card
2. Regular maintenance
3. Insurance
4. Free from dust
5. Protection from fire
6. Protection from theft
7. Air conditioning system
8. Power protection devices

5. Hardware Security Measures
1. ID card:
 Unauthorized persons can steal and damage computer hardware
as well as data and software.
 So it is better not to allow unauthorized persons inside the
computer room.
 The ID card will be more helpful for avoiding unauthorized
persons in the computer room.
 There should be a security guard at the door of computer room
who checks the person's ID card and stops the unauthorized
person to enter into the computer room.
 It keeps our computer system safe.

6. Hardware Security Measures
2. Regular Maintenance:
 The hardware components of computer system are very delicate
devices. If we do not use computer properly, it may not function
well and also may get damage some parts. So regular
maintenance is necessary for proper functioning of our computer
system.
 During the periodic maintenance dust and dirt should clean off
the computer’s devices, loose connections of electricity and
network devices and parts inside .
 We should repair or replace defective parts of hardware in time
before it causes several damages.

7. Hardware Security Measures
 The regular maintenance helps us to find out the problems in
hardware.
 Hard disk is one of the most important parts of computer system
which works as the main storage of computer.
 If it gets damaged we may lose all data, information and
programs on it.
 So it needs to be checked frequently so that we can keep it in
good condition

8. Hardware Security Measures
3. Insurance:
 Insurance is a way to get the investment – whole or part of it –
back in case, the computer system is damaged because of theft,
vandalism or natural calamities like fire or flood.
 If our computer is damaged or lost, we can claim for the
insurance amount and replace the new computer system easily.
So, it is being one of the security measures of computer system.

9. Hardware Security Measures
4. Free from dust:
 Often dust build-up occurs in computer case fans, inside the
power supply or CPU cooler.
 When CPU cooler fails to spin because of dust build-up,
processor can overheat and become damaged.
 If the power supply fan blows, this can become a serious fire
hazard because of the heat being generated. These components
need to be maintained for safety on a regular basis. So, the
compute room has to be absolutely free from dust and air
pollution.

10. Hardware Security Measures
5. Fire extinguisher:
 Install fire extinguishers and fire alarm system in the computer
room. So that in case of fire we can extinguish the fire quickly
and minimize damage.
6. Protection from theft:
 The computer room should have physical security with proper
locking system, controlled access of authorized persons only by
having human guard or biometric machine.
 CCTV (Closed Circuit Television)

11. Hardware Security Measures
7. Air conditioning system: (20 – 24 degree Celsius)
 Regular use of computers produce the heat and increases the
temperature.
• The overheat may result working principle of hardware parts
such as disk failure, breaking down the chips, short life etc.
• So that we need to keep air conditioning system in the computer
room to maintain the room temperature required for computers.

12. Hardware Security Measures
8. Power protection device:
 It is an electronic device that controls the fluctuation of
electronic voltage and provide enough back up to the computer
system when there is power failure.
 Some examples: UPS, CVT (Constant Voltage Transformer),
Spike guard, Stabilizers, Volt guard
Importance of Power Protection Device:
• They are needed in computer system to supply regular voltage
and maintain the power fluctuation from high or low which may
cause several hardware damage as well as software loss.

13. Hardware Security Measures
UPS: (Uninterruptible Power Supply)
 It is a power protection device which stores electricity and
provides backup power automatically to the computer when
required so that huge amount of data can be prevented from
being lost or damaged.
 Hence it allows the users to save important data and information
and prevents them from being lost or damaged.

14. Information Security
 Information Security is a set of practices intended to keep data
secure from unauthorized access or alterations, both when it’s
being stored and when it’s being transmitted from one machine
or location to another.
 The practice of keeping data, information and software protected
from corruption and unauthorized access is known as data and
software security. Or
 Protecting or securing data and software from being pirated
damaged or lost is known as data and software security.

15. Information Security
We can protect our data :
 By periodically checking the hard disk and replacing it if it
shows failure symptoms
 By copying the data in another disk in the system to avoid
accidentally erasing or erasing data by unauthorized person
 Nowadays, we can copy important data into online storage
devices which is also called cloud storage.
 There are many providers who provide space in the cloud for
online storage of our data which include Dropbox, Google Drive,
OneDrive, iCloud. Some of them are free up to the certain size of
storage space.

16. Information Security
 Some of the software security measures:
1. Password protection
2. Backup System
3. Defragmentation
4. Scan disk
5. Virus scanning
6. Hard lock key

17. Information Security
Scan disk:
 It helps us to keep computer hard disk in good condition.
 It checks and fixes errors in the file system, directory system of a disk.
 It detects lost clusters and bad sectors.
 It corrects the problem of lost clusters and tries to recover bad sectors (if
possible)
Defragmentation:
 The process of rearranging the fragmented files in the continuous space on the
disk. When the files are defragmented, the files and programs are loaded
faster than previous.
 Fragmentation: The spreading of the parts of the same disk file over different
locations is called fragmentation. It makes slow disk access and breakdown
the overall performance of the disk operation.

18. Information Security Mechanism
 Security mechanism are technical tools and techniques that are
used to implement security services.
1. Authentication system:
• Identification is the ability to identify uniquely a user or a system
or an application that is running in the system.
• Authentication is the ability to prove that a user or application is
genuinely who that person or what that application claims to be.
• The process of identifying an individual usually based on a
username and password is called an authentication system.
• In security systems, authentication is distinct from authorization,
which is the process of giving individuals access to system
objects based on their identity.

19. Information Security Mechanism
Common forms of authorization:
Password:
 It is a secret word or a sequence of characters that provides
accessibility to a user to access a file, application or computer
system.
 We have to keep the password secure and strong so that
unauthorized users may not gain access to the resource and
misuse it with our identity.

20. Information Security Mechanism
Password:
Following are some of the tips to make our password secure and
strong:
 Don't use a sequence like abcd or 1234 which are, again, easily
guessable.
 Mix characters, numbers and symbols. Also, mix small and
capital letters.
 Avoid using the same password in all applications.
 Change password periodically.
 Don't use easily guessable the name of a pet, child, family
member, birthdays, birthplace, name of a favorite holiday.

21. Information Security Mechanism
Biometric:
 Biometric is biological measurements or physical characteristics
that can be used to identify individuals.
 Nowadays, the character or numeric passwords are being
replaced by biometric authentication.
 Fingerprints, face detection or retina detection are being used as
biometrics authentication.
 Biometrics authentication is considered
more secure than string password.

22. Information Security Mechanism
Firewall:
 When it comes to preventing unauthorized access of the third
party in a private network, firewalls are used.
 A firewall is a system designed to prevent unauthorized access to
or from a private network.
 Firewalls shelter the computer
network of an organization against unauthorized
incoming or outgoing access
and provide the best network
security.
 Firewall prevents unauthorized internet users
from accessing private networks connected to
the internet especially intranet.

23. Information Security Mechanism
Cryptography:
 We share data and information with other people and institutions
through the Internet.
 There are many ways we can share files- we can send them as
email attachments, we can share them from online storage
spaces.
 We can also share them from websites.
 There is a great risk that these data we have shared through the
Internet are accessed by unauthorized users from cloud storage
or they are intercepted by hackers during the transmission.
 Cryptography is the study of secure communications techniques
that allow only the sender and intended recipient of a message to
view its contents.

24. Information Security Mechanism
Cryptography:
 The term is derived from the Greek word “ kryptos”, which
means hidden.
 More generally, cryptography is about constructing and
analyzing protocols that prevent third parties or the public from
reading private messages.
 Cryptography includes ensuring that data/ message cannot be
understood by an unauthorized user.
 There are different types of cryptography technology used.

25. Information Security Mechanism
Encryption:
 The process of encoding a message or information in such a way
that only authorized parties can access it and those who are not
authorized cannot.
 In an encryption scheme, the intended information or message,
referred to as a plain text, is encrypted using an encryption
algorithm a cipher-generating cipher text that can be read only if
decrypted.

26. Information Security Mechanism
Decryption:
 The conversion of encrypted data into its original form is
decryption.
 It is generally a reverse process of encryption.
 It decodes the encrypted information so that an authorized user
can only decrypt the data because decryption requires a secret
key or password.

27. Information Security Mechanism
Antivirus software:
 Antivirus software is a utility software designed to detect and remove viruses
from computer system.
 Antivirus software, nowadays also known as anti-malware, is a computer
program used to prevent, detect, and remove malware.
 Some of the popular antivirus programs are Bitdefender Antivirus Plus 2020,
Norton Antivirus(NAV) Plus, Webroot Secure Anywhere Antivirus, ESET
NOD32 Antivirus, F-Secure Antivirus SAFE, Kaspersky Anti-Virus, etc.
Antivirus performs the following tasks:
i. Scans the files or folders for viruses
ii. Automatically cleans the virus infected files
iii. Monitors the resources of the computer from the viruses
iv. Alerts the user when viruses are found and provide the information about
the virus

28. Information Security Mechanism
Backup system:
 Backup system is the system of copying data and programs into
another location or creating duplicate copy of it’s in a secured
place.
Importance of Backup:
 When data and software are damaged due to the fluctuation of
electric voltage, power failure, viruses or intentional harm, we
can restore data and software from the backup copy (the
duplicate copy of data and software).
 So, backup system helps to protect data and software of a
computer.

29. Information Security Mechanism
Backup system:
 Backup system is the system of copying data and programs into
another location or creating duplicate copy of it’s in a secured
place.
Importance of Backup:
 When data and software are damaged due to the fluctuation of
electric voltage, power failure, viruses or intentional harm, we
can restore data and software from the backup copy (the
duplicate copy of data and software).
 So, backup system helps to protect data and software of a
computer.

30. Security Threats
 Security threats is defined as a risk that which can potentially
harm computer systems and organization.
 The cause could be physical such as someone stealing a
computer that contains vital data or non physical such as virus
attack.
1. Unauthorized access: (Hacker and cracker)
2. Computer virus
3. Phishing:
 Phishing is the fake attempt to obtain sensitive information such
as usernames, passwords and credit card details by disguising
oneself as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication.

31. Security Threats
4. Keylogger:
 Keylogger is hardware or software for recording the keys
pressed on a keyboard secretly so that person using the keyboard
does not know that their actions are being monitored.
 Data can then be retrieved by the person operating the logging
program.
5. Botnet:
 A botnet is a logical collection of Internet-connected devices
such as computers, smartphones or internet of things (IoT)
devices whose security have been breached and control is given
away to a third party.

32. Security Threats
Botnet:
 Each compromised device, known as a"bot", is created when a
device is penetrated by software from a malware (malicious
software) distribution.
 The controller of a botnet is able to direct the activities of these
compromised computers through communication channels
formed by standards-based network protocols, such as Hypertext
Transfer Protocol (HTTP).
 Botnets are increasingly rented out by cybercriminals as
commodities for a variety of purposes.

33. Malicious Code
 Malicious code is the term used to describe any code in any part
of the software system or script that is intended to cause
undesired effects, security breaches or damage the system.
 It is an auto-executable application that can activate itself and
take on various forms, including Java Applets, ActiveX controls,
pushed content, plug-ins, scripting languages or other
programming languages that are designed to enhance Web pages
and email.

34. Malware
 The word Malware is short for malicious software and is a general
term used to describe all of the viruses, spyware, worms, trojan, and
pretty much anything that is specifically designed to cause harm to
your PC or steal your information.
Different types of malware:
i. Virus:
 A virus is a program that copies itself and infects a PC, spreading from
one file to another, and then from one PC to another when the files are
copied or shared.
ii. Spyware:
 Spyware is any software installed on your PC that collects your
information without your knowledge and sends that information back
to the creator so they can use your personal information in some
immoral way.

35. Malware
Adware:
 Adware is a software application used by companies for
marketing purposes; advertising banners are displayed while any
program is running.
 Adware can be automatically downloaded to your system while
browsing any website and can be viewed through pop-up
windows or through a bar that appears on the computer screen
automatically.