The need and the challenge

摘要

While used every day, the term "security" can be deceptively difficult to define and may contain various meanings to different people in divergent contexts. The industry at large seems to have adopted a stance of "I know it when I see it," as opposed to objectively defining the concept. Unfortunately, this creates numerous problems for those who have a need to 'secure' data, or any other asset. For more than two decades, I have served in a number of security functions, and have found it curious that in each industry or domain few, if any, people were able to provide a clear definition of the term 'security'. Many could describe the concept and list characteristics, but nobody could provide an actual definition that could be used to objectively measure whether a building, system, person, or other asset was or was not secure.