Intrusion Detection

An intrusion detection system (IDS) is a device or software application that monitors network or system activities for malicious activities or policy violations and produces electronic reports to a management station. IDS come in a variety of “flavors” and approach the goal of detecting suspicious traffic in different ways. There are network based (NIDS) and host based (HIDS) intrusion detection systems. NIDS is a network security system focusing on the attacks that come from the inside of the network (authorized users). Some systems may attempt to stop an intrusion attempt but this is neither required nor expected of a monitoring system. Intrusion detection and prevention systems (IDPS) are primarily focused on identifying possible incidents, logging information about them, and reporting attempts. In addition, organizations use IDPSes for other purposes, such as identifying problems with security policies, documenting existing threats and deterring individuals from violating security policies. IDPSes have become a necessary addition to the security infrastructure of nearly every organization.

IDPSes typically record information related to observed events, notify security administrators of important observed events and produce reports. Many IDPSes can also respond to a detected threat by attempting to prevent it from succeeding. They use several response techniques, which involve the IDPS stopping the attack itself, changing the security environment (e.g. reconfiguring a firewall) or changing the attack’s content.

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