Chapter 1. Networking Security Concepts

This chapter covers the need for and the building blocks of network and information security, threats to our networks today, and fundamental principles of secure network design. It provides in-depth coverage of the following topics:

Confidentiality, integrity, availability (CIA)

Common security terms

Common network security zones

Describe different network topologies, such as

Campus-area network (CAN)

Cloud, wide-area network (WAN)

Data center

Small office/home office (SOHO)

Although network security has been considered important for quite some time, especially for those of us who have spent a large portion of our careers in the network security field, there has been a surge in public interest over the past year or so due to events that have impacted even the least technically savvy person. It seems as if we cannot go a full week lately without hearing that credit card data or personally identifiable information (PII) has inadvertently been leaked (more accurately, stolen) from banks, retail stores, and the like by malicious actors.

Security has become more complex than ever as the motives and capabilities of threat actors continue to evolve while allowing the miscreants to often stay (at least) one step ahead of those of us in the network security space. In addition, the concept of location of data is becoming blurred by concepts of cloud computing and content-data networks and global load balancing. As we strive to empower employees around the world with ubiquitous access to important data, it is increasingly important to remain constantly vigilant about protecting data and the entities using it (individuals, businesses, governments, and so on).

This chapter covers the fundamental building blocks of network security (implementing and improving), an essential topic that you are ready to master now that you better understand its importance.