Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
table 5.3 threat Cl
asses
Threat Class
Definition/Examples
Natural
Occurring without the benefit of human intervention; acts
of God: hurricane
Accidental
Occurring without specific intent; acts of Clod: open
laptops do not make good coasters and are by nature not
absorbent; travel accident seriously injures entire C-level
team
Contrived—general
Threat to the organization without specific intent to harm
the organization: virus, worm infection, laptop stolen
during auto theft
Contrived—specific
Attack specifically targeting a business or site: bank
robbery, live cyber-attack on network or servers
Technical
Loss of power, power surge; application failure
(undocumented feature); hardware failure
table 5.4 threat Status
Threat Status
Definition/Examples
No threat
X is a threat so unlikely as to be essentially no
threat: magnitude 7 East Coast earthquake
Potential threat
An identified threat with no signs of being a
problem: hurricane forming in the Caribbean,
failure of northeast power grid
Probable threat
Though not visible, good authority confirms its
presence: announcement that terrorists have an
interest in exploiting an organization like yours
Imminent threat (priority
threat)
A threat that's on the radar: ice storm on the way;
new virus disseminating via e-mail technology
used by your organization
Active threat or kinetic threat
(priority threat)
The threat in action: hurricane rages, real-time
cyber-attack
