Cybersecurity Threats, Defense Models, and Zero-Trust Thinking

This chapter introduces the security environment that underlies later privacy, incident-response, and control-testing topics. ISC emphasizes how threats, control objectives, and layered safeguards fit together in a CPA-relevant way.

In This Chapter

• Threat Actors, Attack Vectors, and Evolving Landscapes explains who creates cyber risk and how attacks occur.
• Cybersecurity Strategies: Layers, Defense‑in‑Depth, Zero‑Trust covers the broad design approaches used to reduce exposure.
• COSO Framework Applied to Cybersecurity Risks connects security concerns to a familiar control framework.
• Zero‑Trust Approach to Security examines the logic of trust minimization in modern environments.

How to Use This Chapter

• Read this chapter before the more detailed security chapters if the overall threat model is weak.
• Focus on the security objective each safeguard is trying to protect.
• Return here whenever a question asks for the best high-level security response to a risk.

In this section

• Threat Actors, Attack Vectors, and the Changing Cybersecurity Landscape
  Threat actors, attack vectors, and the changing cybersecurity landscape.
• Defense-in-Depth Strategies, Security Layers, and Zero-Trust Concepts
  Defense-in-depth strategies, layered safeguards, and zero-trust concepts.
• Applying the COSO Framework to Cybersecurity Risk
  Applying COSO concepts to cybersecurity risk and control response.
• The Zero-Trust Security Model and Its Control Implications
  The zero-trust model and its control implications.