Author: Neftaly Malatjie

The process of maintaining multi-user operating system software must ensure that the integrity and security of the software is maintained.

Integrity

To maintain integrity, data must not be changed in transit and steps must be taken to ensure that data cannot be altered by an unauthorized person or program. Such measures include implementing user access controls and version control to prevent erroneous changes or accidental deletion by authorized users. Other measures include the use of checksums and cryptographic checksums to verify integrity. Network administration measures to ensure data integrity include documenting system administration procedures, parameters and maintenance activities, and creating disaster recovery plans for occurrences such as power outages, server failure or security attacks. Should data become corrupted, backups or redundancies must be available to restore the affected data to its correct state.

Security

Security is critical for enterprises and organizations of all sizes and in all industries. Weak security can result in compromised systems or data, either by a malicious threat actor or an unintentional internal threat.

Application security – the protection of applications from threats that seek to manipulate application and access, steal, modify or delete data. These protections use software, hardware and policies, and are sometimes called countermeasures. Common countermeasures include application firewalls, encryption programs, patch management and biometric authentication systems.

In order to keep your system running smoothly there are a few tasks you can perform. Regular maintenance will help keep your computer up to speed and free of annoying problems. All configurations made during the maintenance process must be in accordance with organisational requirements.

Backups

Regular backups can preserve the time, energy and money you invested in the files stored on your computer if a hardware or software problem leaves your system unusable. At the minimum, you should back up your “My Documents” or “Home” directory that contains the work you’ve done and the files you’ve downloaded. In addition, third-party applications like Clonezilla, FOG or Symantec Ghost enable you to create a complete copy or clone of your hard drive that you can use as a backup for every single file on your system.

Hard Disk Health

It is also helpful to periodically check on the health of your hard disk by using your operating system’s built-in error checking tools. Window’s Error Checking utility, the Mac OS X Disk Utility and Linux Fsck can check your disks for system errors or bad sectors and, if possible, fix them.

Security Procedures

Protect your operating system from external threats from viruses, rootkits, spyware or trojan horses. Hardware and software firewalls can help monitor and block the flow of data to and from your system by malevolent software. Anti-virus programs can scan all the files you download for malware and check for unacceptable behavior by programs already on your system. Anti-spyware utilities help alert you to and intercept the activity of software clandestinely collecting and passing along information about you and your computer.

System Upgrades

Finally, keep computer operating system healthy and secure by installing updates provided by your operating system vendor or by the developers of third-party software. Malicious hackers often try to exploit operating systems and applications that are not up to date and vulnerable. Updates may provide critical security patches, bug fixes, performance enhancements or additional features to your operating system or installed applications.