Availability
Definition
The property that systems and data are accessible to authorised users when needed. Protected by redundancy, backup, failover, and incident response capabilities. Breached by denial-of-service attacks, hardware failure, or ransomware.
Related terms
- Confidentiality
- The property that information is not disclosed to unauthorised individuals, processes, or devices. Protected by access controls, encryption, and need-to-know policies. Breached...
- Integrity
- The property that information is accurate, complete, and has not been modified without authorisation. Protected by cryptographic hashing, digital signatures, and change...
- Non-repudiation
- The property that a party cannot deny having performed an action. Provided by digital signatures, timestamped audit logs, and certified delivery receipts....
- Threat
- A potential cause of an unwanted incident that could harm an asset. Threats may be natural (flood, fire), environmental (power failure), human...
- Vulnerability
- A weakness in an asset or in a control protecting that asset, which a threat could exploit to cause harm. Examples: an...
Explained in
- The CIA Triad and Security FundamentalsThe property that systems and data are accessible to authorised users when needed. Protected by redundancy, backup, failover, and incident response capabilitie...