Failing badly

Failing badly and failing well are concepts in systems security and network security (and engineering in general) describing how a system reacts to failure. The terms have been popularized by Bruce Schneier, a cryptographer and security consultant.[1][2]

A system that fails badly is one that fails catastrophically once failure occurs. A single point of failure can thus bring down the whole system. Examples include:

A system that fails well is one that compartmentalizes or contains failure. Examples include:

Designing a system to 'fail well' has also been alleged to be a better use of limited security funds than the typical quest to eliminate all potential sources of errors and failure.[4]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Homeland Insecurity, Atlantic Monthly, September 2002
  2. David Hillson (29 March 2011). The Failure Files: Perspectives on Failure. Triarchy Press. p. 146.
  3. 1 2 Eric Vanderburg (February 18, 2013). "Fail Secure – The right way to fail". PC Security World. PC Security World.
  4. Failing Well with Information Security - Young, William; Apogee Ltd Consulting, 2003
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Saturday, February 28, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.