Security Overview - Concepedia

Principles

Definition

Security is a multifaceted academic concept and field of study concerned with the conditions and processes of protecting entities from threats and risks. It investigates vulnerabilities, adversarial actions, protective measures, and the complex dynamics influencing stability, resilience, and survival across various levels of analysis, from the individual to the global system.

Ontological type

Theoretical Traditions

Levels of Analysis

Security Sectors

Key developments

Key Figures

Formal Security Foundations era

Ronald L. Rivest [1] is a central figure in Formal Security Foundations, with affiliations at Massachusetts Institute of Technology [3] and Stanford University [4] during this era. His 1983 paper A method for obtaining digital signatures and public-key cryptosystems [7] advanced practical public-key cryptography and digital signatures, enabling secure authentication and non-repudiation, which were foundational for this era's emphasis on formal security models. Ravi Sandhu [2] emerges as a key contributor within Institutional RBAC developments, with affiliations at University of Birmingham [5] and The Ohio State University [6] during this period. His 1996 paper Role-based access control models [8] formalized RBAC concepts that systematized policy specification and access control administration, providing scalable, rigorous mechanisms aligned with formal security foundations of the era.

Cloud and Critical Security era

Alberto Coen‑Porisini[1] is associated with the University of Insubria[3] in the Cloud and Critical Security era (2009–2015). His work includes the paper Security, privacy and trust in Internet of Things: The road ahead[4], published in 2014, which outlines security, privacy and trust considerations for IoT that were foundational for governance-oriented defense in distributed cloud and CPS landscapes. Alessandra Rizzardi[2] is associated with the University of Insubria[3] in the Cloud and Critical Security era. Her contributions center on the same paper Security, privacy and trust in Internet of Things: The road ahead[4], highlighting governance, privacy-preserving data sharing, and trust mechanisms essential for cross-domain data flows in multi-tenant environments.

Decentralized IoT Security era

Khaled Salah [1], associated with Cardiff University [3] and the University of Georgia [4], helped shape decentralized IoT security discourse in this era. His key contributions are reflected in the 2017 paper IoT security: Review, blockchain solutions, and open challenges [7], which surveys blockchain-based security approaches and outlines open challenges, underscoring why decentralized trust and tamper-evident mechanisms are crucial for edge, resource-constrained IoT. Ahmad-Reza Sadeghi [2], affiliated with University of California, San Diego [5] and University of California, Irvine [6], contributed to IoT security scholarship during this period. His contributions are exemplified by IoT SENTINEL: Automated Device-Type Identification for Security Enforcement in IoT [8] and Security analysis on consumer and industrial IoT devices [9], which advanced automatic device-type identification and systematic security assessments as essential building blocks for enforcement and resilience in decentralized IoT.