Post a total of 3 substantive responses over 2 separate days for full participation. This includes your initial post and 2 replies to classmates or your faculty member.

Due Day 3 

Let’s face it: any organization’s system and information are at risk. Integrated risk management is about protecting what’s important to the organization. Reliable decision-making is as much about long-term planning as it is about incident response.

Respond to the following in a minimum of 175 words:

Discuss the differences between software and hardware vulnerabilities. What threats would likely exploit these vulnerabilities? What impact might these vulnerabilities have on a business, and how might they be prevented or mitigated through risk management?

Due Day 7

Post 2 replies to classmates or your faculty member. Be constructive and professional.

Reply 1 (Jamar Carter): 

Hello Class, The difference between software and hardware vulnerabilities are that the different types have various vulnerabilities and risk that may arise in dealing with creating the correct outcome. Some threats may come to a software project that may not have but the slightest effect on a hardware process of the completion destination. When dealing with software, the majority of the world may be at risk of becoming victims of threats. Each human in the world has an identity; thus having a chance that a criminal can gain access to that person through the internet. Organization’s, businesses, and companies that are large and small needs to watch out for cyber threats. Fire walls, access controls, and training of staff on how to combat cyber threats may be crucial for software venerability protection. Otherwise, hardware will not have as many problems as the vast world of software. Problems with hardware may include the risk of keeping older hardware that is obsolete in service before balancing the cost versus the reward for purchasing new hardware that may become useful.

Reply 2 (Michael Nelson): Good evening class,

When we are talking about vulnerabilities between hardware and software there are a few things to note the differences between the two and also some overlap as well. The Software side of the vulnerabilities can be short-term to a long-term issue, but more times than not they can be patched once they are discovered to become more secure. This is why software updates are important as long as you have a backup just in case the update breaks something. One exploit that has used a software vulnerability would be ransomware. This would encrypt your files and in exchange for the key to unlock them, it would usually be some sort of cryptocurrency. When we talk about hardware vulnerabilities, these can cost the company time and money just like the software but more in the area of possibly having to obtain new equipment. One of the recent hardware vulnerabilities that have been seen on the news is would be meltdown and specter. These type of issues may not be patched as easily as a software vulnerability. One of the ways they can overlap is the use of the microphone and speakers to send a virus to other computers in the same room. This is why some installations are now taking precautions for this type of attack that can happen even if your laptop is not connected to a network at all. All of these types of vulnerabilities can and do cost companies millions of dollars and thousands of hours of time to investigate. These also hurt the customer’s trust and willingness to do business with a company as well.