WHITE PAPER ON PROTECTING CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION PUBLISHED

July 2014

Nexor and FOX-IT have today published a new White Paper “Protecting confidential information using a Data Diode” in response to customer queries in the sector.

The data diode is one component in the Secure Information Exchange toolbox but its role is often misunderstood. Colin Robbins, Technical Director at Nexor and co-author of the White Paper, commented:

“We are regularly asked by our customers whether a data diode gives a protocol break; and what the relationship between the two is. There are also differing views in the sector of what a protocol break actually is. So to try and piece this all together we collaborated with our colleagues at FOX-IT to clarify the role of the data diode and show that it offers more than just one-way communication.”

When protecting an isolated network against outsider attacks, there are a number of objectives and technologies that are commonly used. Objectives typically boil down to C.I.A. – Confidentiality, Integrity and Availability.

An extremely good technology for confidentiality is the unidirectional network connection by means of a data diode. However, there is a lot of technology relating to data diodes that impacts integrity and availability. In particular, protocol breaks and content checking have a subtle relation to these objectives.

This briefing paper will explain how these technologies relate to one another and to the principal C.I.A. security objectives.

This newest addition to the Nexor resources library can now be downloaded from the White Papers section of our website.