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What is Information Security?

The four basic Information Security services are:

• Data Integrity: Detecting if information has been altered by unauthorised or unknown means.
• Secrecy (Confidentiality): Keeping information secret from all but those who are authorised to see it.
• Authentication: Corroboration of the identity of an entity (for example, a person, computer terminal or smart card).
• Non-repudiation: Preventing the denial of previous commitments or actions.

Information security services are currently provided by a combination of physical protection, secret or inherent information, authentic channels and protocols based on cryptographic primitives such as encryption.

As our day-to-day personal communications and business interactions are increasingly being conducted by electronic means over the Internet, and Web Services-based applications are increasingly becoming available, these four security properties of information are rapidly growing in importance as we seek to protect the privacy of our personal information and the integrity of our business transactions.