What is AAA in Cyber-Security?
Tags: security, cybersecurity, beginners, computerscience
Published: 2023-02-19 09:24:15

Cyber-Security is a vast and never-ending factor in any organization, as with more advancing of technology, attacks are getting more complex. To prevent such attacks, firms take every precautionary measure and follows the fundamentals to strengthen the digital security. 

And AAA is one of the most important fundamentals, that every organization must know and implement. To understand it more thoroughly, let’s move further. 

##What Does AAA Stands For? 
AAA stands for **Authentication, Authorization and Accountability**. 

In the security field, professionals consider it as framework, under which an enterprise configure policies and implement security mechanisms to secure data and systems from malicious actors. Moreover, all three components of AAA work in collaboration, helping to build a strong digital security foundation. 

###Authentication 
In simple terms, Authentication is verifying an identity of a person or a system. Whenever you log into your Gmail, Apple mail or Outlook account, you input your username and password. The mailing system only provides the access, if user credentials are correct. Here, the verification of username and password is an example of authenticating your identity.

Similarly, in cyber-security, there are various other mechanisms through which identity can get verified. It helps the organizations to prevent malicious actors from entering into their network. And it allows only legitimate or registered users to access and utilize resources. 

Furthermore, there are multiple ways in which identity can be authenticated, such as: 
* Scanning of fingerprint
* Retina or Iris scanning 
* Username and Password 
* Hardware Token 
* Cookies 
* Voice recognition 
* Location 
* Digital Signatures 

###Authorization 
Once the system validates the identity, the next step comes into security is Authorization. It helps to provide relevant permissions to user to execute certain operations. And it also confirms that only relevant permissions are getting provided to a specific user. 

For instance, if you implement authorization, it will help you efficiently differentiate privilege of different user groups. It will not let an average user to access administrative controls. An Access Control List (ACL) is also a primary example of it. When you configure an ACL, it checks whether it has to block a specific user from accessing resources or not. 

Additionally, you can create Whitelists and Blacklists, enabling only legitimate systems to enter into network or system and execute operations at a certain level. 

###Accountability
Accountability means to take responsibility or analyzing who is responsible for executing a specific task or utilizing a resource. In cyber-security accountability helps to analyze activity of a specific end-user or system. And it also aids in fulfilling non-repudiation.

A logging server gets created for accounting, which stores the IP address and data getting transmitted to and from a specific system. Moreover, it also aids in identifying a root cause of a cyber-attack. 

For instance, if someone in your organization is transferring your data to an external firm, then you can easily track it down. You can open the logs of accounting server and analyze log files. It will provide you information that system with a particular MAC or IP address is sending data to an external network. Then, you can effortlessly identify who uses that system and your culprit will be in front of you. 

##Wrapping Up
AAA is a fundamental pillar of cyber-security and security experts must understand it. Without AAA, the firm’s security can lack at some points, which can be heavily harmful and risky. Therefore, Authentication, Authorization and Accountability must be in focus while working on cyber-security.