Network Risk Assestment and recommended actions Research Paper

Network Risk Assestment and recommended actions - Research Paper Example Application attacks are gaining popularity. Networked based fire walls will not be able to effectively keep the system secure from this kind of attack. Though some firewalls in networks have application firewall capabilities, most are considered to be underpowered by experts, providing less protection than the available firewalls that are single purpose. Actually, network firewalls have no capacity what so ever to protect against custom web applications (Eschenauer and Gligor, 1). This nature of a network security infrastructure leaves the organizations web resources at risk with dire consequences on the organization Quantitative risk analysis regarding the network architecture Asses Value Asset Value Cost of maintenances Profits to the company Worth in competition Recovering cost Acquisition cost Firewalls 4,000 100 per month 10,000 per month 2,000 1,000 5,000 Web server 5,000 100 per month 10,000 per month 2,000 1,000 7,000 Database Server 5,000 100 per month 10,000 per month 2,000 1,000 7,000 Table: 1 Estimate of potential Loss per Threat The table below shows the estimate potential loss per threat Asset Cost of physical damage Cost of loss in productivity Cost if information is disclosed Cost if critical devices fail Firewalls 4,000 10,000 120,000 10,000 Web server 5,000 15,000 1,000 15,000 Database Server 5,000 30,000 200,000 10,000 Table: 2 Application attacks can also be used to gain access into various departments in an organization, For instance gaining access into a database administrator, financial controller, or system administrator can provide an attacker access to information to these departments which may be having information that may contain passwords for credit card numbers which can be used to steal identity, or have dire financial implications to an organization or a company. Risk factor two Another issue is that the basic implementation has its default use of well-known UDP and TCP and ports for communication. Unfortunately for this organiz ation’s Web applications are packaged-solutions, hence the organization is unable to makes change to the prescribed ports. Therefore, systems in the demilitarized zones (DMZ) will be compromised; it is easy for the attacker to compromise the systems because of the default TCP/UDP portals. In addition, systems in the demilitarized zones experience little to no monitoring or security-controls. Only one server that will be compromised before an intruder to access the Web applications Because of these shortfalls, the basic architectural technique no longer gives the kind or level of security currently being required by online cash transfer companies like VISA Cardholder-Information-Security- Program (CISP) and Payment-Card-Industry (PCI) security standards, Federal-Information-System-Management-Act (FISMA), GLBA, SOX and more other regulatory and industry-security standards engaged in this compliance effort. Risk Factor 3 Physical factors like act of nature, earth quakes, floods and fires often cause irreversible damage on networking hardware. Some of these calamities are unpredictable, and can cause extensive damage in an organization’s network system with great loses, damaged equipments can result to loss of sensitive data and information, negatively affecting productivity with end effect being heavy losses on an organization. Another physical factor that poses security threats to the network system is unauthorized access to where the various devices and