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Do You Know These 7 Terms About Cyber Threats and Vulnerabilities?

Do You Know These 7 Terms About Cyber Threats and Vulnerabilities?

Blog Article Published: 04/19/2024

Written by Megan Theimer, Content Program Specialist, CSA.

In today's digitally interconnected world, where cybercriminals continue to advance as technology does, understanding the landscape of cyber threats and vulnerabilities is crucial for both individuals and organizations. Below, we define seven fundamental terms and provide additional resources that will help you begin to better understand what cyber threats and vulnerabilities are and what you can do about them.


1. Threat

Anything with the potential to cause harm to an information system in the form of destruction, disclosure, denial of service, or adverse modification of the intended behavior of the system or its data.

Review the eleven top threats to cloud computing.


2. Threat Modeling

A category of activities designed to identify threats and preventative measures for a system or application.

Learn how to model threats in the cloud.


3. Vulnerability

Something that allows an attacker to gain an advantage, ranging from full control of the system to a slight influence over it.

Get a philosophical, yet practical, explanation of what a vulnerability even is.


4. Vulnerability Management

The cyclical practice of identifying, classifying, and remediating or mitigating vulnerabilities (generally in software).

Understand current challenges in vulnerability assessment and mitigation practices.


5. Vulnerability Scanning

The process used to identify security vulnerabilities in a target infrastructure or system.

Discover the top concerns and solutions for cloud and web threats.


6. Attack Surface

The entry points where an unauthorized user can try to gain access to data or to a system. Keeping these surfaces as small as possible is a basic way to eliminate vulnerabilities to the cloud.

Learn how to minimize your data attack surface.


7. Attack Pattern

A description of a common attack used by malicious parties. Programmers must be aware of these patterns in order to defend against them.

Get the basics on ten different types of cyber attacks.



These resources are just the beginning of what CSA has to offer. Watch on-demand recordings of the CSA Cloud Threats & Vulnerabilities Summit 2024 to get a more holistic understanding of the most critical threats and vulnerabilities facing us today.

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