Cybersecurity Glossary

A share is any resource that has been made public on a system or network, such as a directory (file share) or printer (printer share).

Security engineering is an interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of secure systems. It focuses on defining customer needs, security protection requirements, and required functionality early in the systems development life cycle, documenting requirements, and then proceeding with design, synthesis, and system validation while considering the complete problem.

Security specification is the detailed description of the safeguards required to protect an information system.

Secure erase is an overwrite technology using a firmware-based process to overwrite a hard drive. Is a drive command defined in the ANSI ATA and SCSI disk drive interface specifications, which runs inside drive hardware. It completes in about 1/8 the time of 5220 block erasure.

Security categorization is the process of determining the security category for information or an information system. The process of determining the security category for information or an information system. Security categorization methodologies are described in CNSS instruction 1253 for national security systems and in FIPS 199 for other than national security systems.

Sensitive information is data that must be protected from unauthorized access to safeguard the privacy or security of an individual, organization, or nation. Information sensitivity is the control of access to information or knowledge that might result in loss of an advantage or level of security, if disclosed to others.

Simple network management protocol (SNMP) is an internet-standard protocol for managing devices on ip networks. Devices that typically support SNMP include routers, switches, servers, workstations, printers, modem racks and more. SNMP is widely used in network management systems to monitor network-attached devices for conditions that warrant administrative attention.

A security features user's guide (AFUG) is a guide or manual explaining how the security mechanisms in a specific system work.

Security assertion markup language (SAML) is an xml-based security specification developed by the Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS) for exchanging authentication (and authorization) information between trusted entities over the internet. A framework for exchanging authentication and authorization information. Security typically involves checking the credentials presented by a party for authentication and authorization. Saml standardizes the representation of these credentials in an xml format called “assertions,” enhancing the interoperability between disparate applications. A protocol consisting of xml-based request and response message formats for exchanging security information, expressed in the form of assertions about subjects, between online business partners.

A session is a virtual connection between two hosts by which network traffic is passed. It is a way to store information (in variables) to be used across multiple pages.