Operating System Security

In designing computer systems and software, it is essential to manage security risks effectively and implement measures to enforce security policies. However, it’s crucial to strike a balance, as stringent security measures can increase costs and limit the system’s usability, utility, and efficiency. Consequently, system designers must ensure high performance without compromising security.

Operating system security involves ensuring the availability, confidentiality, and integrity of the OS. It includes measures and processes to protect the operating system from threats such as viruses, worms, malware, and remote hacker intrusions. This security encompasses all preventive controls to safeguard system assets from being stolen, altered, or deleted in the event of a security breach.

Security in this context means safeguarding computer system resources like software, CPU, memory, disks, etc., from threats, including viruses and unauthorized access. This protection is achieved by maintaining the operating system’s integrity, confidentiality, and availability. Unauthorized execution of computer applications can result in severe damage to the computer or the data it holds.

System security can be compromised through two main violations:

1. A program with the potential to cause significant harm to the system.
2. Attack. A security breach that enables unauthorized access to a resource.

Security breaches can be classified as either malicious or accidental. Malicious threats involve harmful computer code or web scripts designed to exploit system vulnerabilities, leading to security breaches and backdoors. Accidental threats, though generally easier to protect against, can still cause significant damage that can occur in sam various such as “

1. Breach of Integrity, Unauthorized modification of data.
2. Theft of Service,Unauthorized use of system resources.
3. Breach of Confidentiality, Unauthorized reading of data.
4. Breach of Availability, Unauthorized destruction of data.
5. Denial of Service (DoS), Preventing legitimate use of the system,

Goals of the System Security

System security aims to achieve several goals, including:

1. Integrity, Preventing unauthorized users from accessing system objects and ensuring users with insufficient rights cannot modify critical files and resources.
2. Secrecy, Restricting access to system objects to a select group of authorized users, ensuring system files are not accessible to everyone.
3. Availability, Ensuring all system resources are accessible to authorized users, preventing any single user or process from monopolizing resources, which could lead to service denial. Malware may exploit this by restricting system resources, hindering legitimate processes.

By understanding and implementing these security measures, system designers can create robust and secure operating systems that protect against various threats while maintaining optimal performance.