Explanation/Reference:
It is possible that an organization may not need a disaster recovery plan. An organization may not have any critical processing areas or system and they would be able to withstand lengthy interruptions.
Remember that DRP is related to systems needed to support your most critical business functions.
The DRP plan covers actions to be taken when a disaster occur but DRP PLANNING which is the keywork in the question would also include steps that happen before you use the plan such as development of the plan, training, drills, logistics, and a lot more.
To be effective, the plan would certainly cover before, during, and after the disaster actions.
It may take you a couple years to develop a plan for a medium size company, there is a lot that has to happen before the plan would be actually used in a real disaster scenario. Plan for the worst and hope for the best.
All other statements are true.
NOTE FROM CLEMENT:
Below is a great article on who legally needs a plan which is very much in line with this question. Does EVERY company needs a plan? The legal answer is NO. Some companies, industries, will be required according to laws or regulations to have a plan. A blank statement saying: All companies MUST have a plan would not be accurate. The article below is specific to the USA but similar laws will exist in many other countries.
Some companies such as utilities, power, etc... might also need plan if they have been defined as Critical Infrastructure by the government. The legal side of IT is always very complex and varies in different countries. Always talk to your lawyer to ensure you follow the law of the land :-) Read the details below:
So Who, Legally, MUST Plan?
With the caveats above, let's cover a few of the common laws where there is a duty to have a disaster recovery plan. I will try to include the basis for that requirement, where there is an implied mandate to do so, and what the difference is between the two
Banks and Financial Institutions MUST Have a Plan
The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (Council) was established on March 10, 1979, pursuant to Title X of the Financial Institutions Regulatory and Interest Rate Control Act of 1978 (FIRA), Public Law 95-630. In 1989, Title XI of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery and Enforcement Act of
1989 (FIRREA) established the Examination Council (the Council).
The Council is a formal interagency body empowered to prescribe uniform principles, standards, and report forms for the federal examination of financial institutions by the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (FRB), the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS); and to make recommendations to promote uniformity in the supervision of financial institutions. In other words, every bank, savings and loan, credit union, and other financial institution is governed by the principles adopted by the Council.
In March of 2003, the Council released its Business Continuity Planning handbook designed to provide guidance and examination procedures for examiners in evaluating financial institution and service provider risk-management processes.
Stockbrokers MUST Have a Plan
The National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD) has adopted rules that require all its members to have business continuity plans. The NASD oversees the activities of more than 5,100 brokerage firms, approximately 130,800 branch offices and more than 658,770 registered securities representatives.
As of June 14, 2004, the rules apply to all NASD member firms. The requirements, which are specified in Rule 3510, begin with the following:
3510. Business Continuity Plans. (a) Each member must create and maintain a written business continuity plan identifying procedures relating to an emergency or significant business disruption. Such procedures must be reasonably designed to enable the member to meet its existing obligations to customers. In addition, such procedures must address the member's existing relationships with other broker-dealers and counter-parties. The business continuity plan must be made available promptly upon request to NASD staff.
NOTE:
The rules apply to every company that deals in securities, such as brokers, dealers, and their representatives, it does NOT apply to the listed companies themselves.
Electric Utilities WILL Need a Plan
The disaster recovery function relating to the electric utility grid is presently undergoing a change. Prior to
2005, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) could only coordinate volunteer efforts between utilities. This has changed with the adoption of Title XII of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (16 U.S.C. 824o).
That new law authorizes the FERC to create an Electric Reliability Organization (ERO).
The ERO will have the capability to adopt and enforce reliability standards for "all users, owners, and operators of the bulk power system" in the United States. At this time, FERC is in the process of finalizing the rules for the creation of the ERO. Once the ERO is created, it will begin the process of establishing reliability standards.
It is very safe to assume that the ERO will adopt standards for service restoration and disaster recovery, particularly after such widespread disasters as Hurricane Katrina.
Telecommunications Utilities SHOULD Have Plans, but MIGHT NOT
Telecommunications utilities are governed on the federal level by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) for interstate services and by state Public Utility Commissions (PUCs) for services within the state.
The FCC has created the Network Reliability and Interoperability Council (NRIC). The role of the NRIC is to develop recommendations for the FCC and the telecommunications industry to "insure [sic] optimal reliability, security, interoperability and interconnectivity of, and accessibility to, public communications networks and the internet." The NRIC members are senior representatives of providers and users of telecommunications services and products, including telecommunications carriers, the satellite, cable television, wireless and computer industries, trade associations, labor and consumer representatives, manufacturers, research organizations, and government-related organizations.
There is no explicit provision that we could find that says telecommunications carriers must have a Disaster Recovery Plan. As I have stated frequently in this series of articles on disaster recovery, however, telecommunications facilities are tempting targets for terrorism. I have not changed my mind in that regard and urge caution.
You might also want to consider what the liability of a telephone company is if it does have a disaster that causes loss to your organization. In three words: It's not much. The following is the statement used in most telephone company tariffs with regard to its liability:
The Telephone Company's liability, if any, for its gross negligence or willful misconduct is not limited by this tariff. With respect to any other claim or suit, by a customer or any others, for damages arising out of mistakes, omissions, interruptions, delays or errors, or defects in transmission occurring in the course of furnishing services hereunder, the Telephone Company's liability, if any, shall not exceed an amount equivalent to the proportionate charge to the customer for the period of service during which such mistake, omission, interruption, delay, error or defect in transmission or service occurs and continues. (Source, General Exchange Tariff for major carrier)
All Health Care Providers WILL Need a Disaster Recovery Plan
HIPAA is an acronym for the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, Public Law 104-
191, which amended the Internal Revenue Service Code of 1986. Also known as the Kennedy-Kassebaum Act, the Act includes a section, Title II, entitled Administrative Simplification, requiring "Improved efficiency in healthcare delivery by standardizing electronic data interchange, and protection of confidentiality and security of health data through setting and enforcing standards."
The legislation called upon the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to publish new rules that will ensure security standards protecting the confidentiality and integrity of "individually identifiable health information," past, present, or future.
The final Security Rule was published by HHS on February 20, 2003 and provides for a uniform level of protection of all health information that is housed or transmitted electronically and that pertains to an individual.
The Security Rule requires covered entities to ensure the confidentiality, integrity, and availability of all electronic protected health information (ePHI) that the covered entity creates, receives, maintains, or transmits. It also requires entities to protect against any reasonably anticipated threats or hazards to the security or integrity of ePHI, protect against any reasonably anticipated uses or disclosures of such information that are not permitted or required by the Privacy Rule, and ensure compliance by their workforce.
Required safeguards include application of appropriate policies and procedures, safeguarding physical access to ePHI, and ensuring that technical security measures are in place to protect networks, computers and other electronic devices.
Companies with More than 10 Employees
The United States Department of Labor has adopted numerous rules and regulations in regard to workplace safety as part of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. For example, 29 USC 654 specifically requires:
(a) Each employer:
(1) shall furnish to each of his employees employment and a place of employment which are free from recognized hazards that are causing or are likely to cause death or serious physical harm to his employees;
(2) shall comply with occupational safety and health standards promulgated under this Act.
(b) Each employee shall comply with occupational safety and health standards and all rules, regulations, and orders issued pursuant to this Act which are applicable to his own actions and conduct.
Other Considerations or Expensive Research Qs for Lawyers (Sorry, Eddie!) The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act of 1977
Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Law for Protecting Taxpayer Information
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Mandated Requirements
Homeland Security and Terrorist Prevention
Pandemic (Bird Flu) Prevention
ISO 9000 Certification
Requirements for Radio and TV Broadcasters
Contract Obligations to Customers
Document Protection and Retention Laws
Personal Identity Theft...and MORE!
Suffice it to say you will need to check with your legal department for specific requirements in your business and industry!
I would like to thank my good friend, Eddie M. Pope, for his insightful contributions to this article, our upcoming book, and my ever-growing pool of lawyer jokes. If you want more information on the legal aspects of recovery planning, Eddie can be contacted at my company or via email at mailto:[email protected]. (Eddie cannot, of course, give you legal advice, but he can point you in the right direction.)
I hope this article helps you better understand the complex realities of the legal reasons why we plan and wish you the best of luck
See original article at: http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=777896 See another interesting article on the subject at: http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?
p=677910&seqNum=1
References used for this question:
KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, John Wiley & Sons, 2001, Chapter 8: Business Continuity Planning and Disaster Recovery Planning (page 281).

Explanation/Reference:
An issue with signature-based ID is that only attack signatures that are stored in their database are detected.
New attacks without a signature would not be reported. They do require constant updates in order to maintain their effectiveness.
Reference used for this question:
KRUTZ, Ronald L. & VINES, Russel D., The CISSP Prep Guide: Mastering the Ten Domains of Computer Security, 2001, John Wiley & Sons, Page 49.

Section: Security Operation Adimnistration
Explanation/Reference:
Management is responsible for protecting all assets that are directly or indirectly under their control.
They must ensure that employees understand their obligations to protect the company's assets, and implement security in accordance with the company policy. Finally, management is responsible for initiating corrective actions when there are security violations.
Source: HARE, Chris, Security management Practices CISSP Open Study Guide, version 1.0, april 1999.

Section: Cryptography
Explanation/Reference:
With the advent of public key cryptography (PKI), it is now possible to communicate securely with untrusted parties over the Internet without prior arrangement. One of the necessities arising from such communication is the ability to accurately verify someone's identity (i.e. whether the person you are communicating with is indeed the person who he/she claims to be). In order to be able to perform identity check for a given entity, there should be a fool-proof method of "binding" the entity's public key to its unique domain name (DN).
A X.509 digital certificate issued by a well known certificate authority (CA), like Verisign, Entrust, Thawte, etc., provides a way of positively identifying the entity by placing trust on the CA to have performed the necessary verifications. A X.509 certificate is a cryptographically sealed data object that contains the entity's unique DN, public key, serial number, validity period, and possibly other extensions.
The Windows Operating System offers a Certificate Viewer utility which allows you to double-click on any certificate and review its attributes in a human-readable format. For instance, the "General" tab in the Certificate Viewer Window (see below) shows who the certificate was issued to as well as the certificate's issuer, validation period and usage functions.

Certification Path graphic
The "Certification Path" tab contains the hierarchy for the chain of certificates. It allows you to select the certificate issuer or a subordinate certificate and then click on "View Certificate" to open the certificate in the Certificate Viewer.
Each end-user certificate is signed by its issuer, a trusted CA, by taking a hash value (MD5 or SHA-1) of ASN.1 DER (Distinguished Encoding Rule) encoded object and then encrypting the resulting hash with the issuer's private key (CA's Private Key) which is a digital signature. The encrypted data is stored in the
"signatureValue" attribute of the entity's (CA) public certificate.
Once the certificate is signed by the issuer, a party who wishes to communicate with this entity can then take the entity's public certificate and find out who the issuer of the certificate is. Once the issuer's of the certificate (CA) is identified, it would be possible to decrypt the value of the "signatureValue" attribute in the entity's certificate using the issuer's public key to retrieve the hash value. This hash value will be compared with the independently calculated hash on the entity's certificate. If the two hash values match, then the information contained within the certificate must not have been altered and, therefore, one must trust that the CA has done enough background check to ensure that all details in the entity's certificate are accurate.
The process of cryptographically checking the signatures of all certificates in the certificate chain is called "key chaining". An additional check that is essential to key chaining is verifying that the value of the
"subjectKeyIdentifier" extension in one certificate matches the same in the subsequent certificate.
Similarly, the process of comparing the subject field of the issuer certificate to the issuer field of the subordinate certificate is called "name chaining". In this process, these values must match for each pair of adjacent certificates in the certification path in order to guarantee that the path represents unbroken chain of entities relating directly to one another and that it has no missing links.
The two steps above are the steps to validate the Certification Path by ensuring the validity of all certificates of the certificate chain to the root certificate as described in the two paragraphs above.
Reference(s) used for this question:
FORD, Warwick & BAUM, Michael S., Secure Electronic Commerce: Building the Infrastructure for Digital Signatures and Encryption (2nd Edition), 2000, Prentice Hall PTR, Page 262.
and
https://www.tibcommunity.com/docs/DOC-2197

A security policy is an important document to develop while designing an information system. The security policy begins with the organization's basic commitment to information security formulated as a general policy statement.
The policy is then applied to all aspects of the system design or security solution. The policy identifies security goals (e.g., confidentiality, integrity, availability, accountability, and assurance) the system should support, and these goals guide the procedures, standards and controls used in the IT security architecture design.
The policy also should require definition of critical assets, the perceived threat, and security-related roles and responsibilities.
Source: STONEBURNER, Gary & al, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), NIST Special Publication 800-27, Engineering Principles for Information Technology Security (A Baseline for Achieving Security), June 2001 (page 6).