Book Image

CompTIA Security+ Certification Guide

By : Ian Neil
Book Image

CompTIA Security+ Certification Guide

By: Ian Neil

Overview of this book

CompTIA Security+ is a worldwide certification that establishes the fundamental knowledge required to perform core security functions and pursue an IT security career. CompTIA Security+ Certification Guide is a best-in-class exam study guide that covers all of CompTIA Security+ 501 exam objectives. It is authored by Ian Neil, who is a world-class trainer of CompTIA Security+ 501. Packed with self-assessment scenarios and realistic exam questions, this guide will help you master the core concepts to succeed in the exam the first time you take it. Using relevant examples, you will learn all the important security fundamentals from Certificates and Encryption to Identity and Access Management concepts. You will then dive into the important domains of the exam; namely, threats, attacks and vulnerabilities, technologies and tools, architecture and design, risk management, and cryptography and Public Key Infrastructure (PKI). This book comes with over 600 practice questions with detailed explanation that is at the exam level and also includes two mock exams to help you with your study plan. This guide will ensure that encryption and certificates are made easy for you.
Table of Contents (18 chapters)
12
Mock Exam 1
13
Mock Exam 2
15
Acronyms

Hashing and Data Integrity

Hashing is where the data inside a document is hashed using an algorithm, such as a Secure Hash Algorithm version 1 (SHA1) or MD5. This turns the data inside the file into a long text string known as a hash value; this is also known as a message digest.

While you are hashing the same data, if you copy a file and therefore have two files containing the same data, then hash them with the same hashing algorithm, it will always produce the same hash value. Please look at the following example:

  • Verifying Integrity: During forensic analysis, a scientist takes a copy of the data prior to investigation. To ensure that they have not tampered with it during investigation, they will hash the data before starting and then compare the hash to the data when finished. If the hash matches, then they know that the integrity of the data is intact.
  • One-Way Function: For...