Knowledge stores that organizations can draw information for solving any business problems.
Published in Chapter:
Knowledge Management and Information Technology Security Services
Pauline Ratnasingam (University of Central Missouri, USA)
Copyright: © 2009
|Pages: 7
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-60566-014-1.ch111
Abstract
With the explosion of the Internet and Web technologies as a medium of exchange, issues such as knowledge coordination problems, knowledge transfer problems, and knowledge reuse problems related in IT security knowledge management have been growing exponentially. These problems arise from the complexities faced by individuals, groups, and organizations in recognizing the nature of knowledge needed to solve problems or make decisions. Knowledge management (KM) provides a formal mechanism for identifying and distributing knowledge. It is the discipline that focuses on capturing, organizing, sharing, and retaining key corporate knowledge as an asset (McManus & Snyder, 2002). KM ensures that the right knowledge is available in the right representation to the right processors (humans or machines) at the right time for the right costs (Holsapple & Singh, 2005). Benefits of proper KM include improved organizational effectiveness, delivery of customer value and satisfaction, and added product and service innovation. There is no reason to believe that IT security will be an exception in the context of KM and IT. It has been recognized that the first step in the KM process is to identify or define knowledge needs. This article aims to discuss the role of knowledge management categories, namely knowledge resources, knowledge characteristics, knowledge dimensions, and stakeholders in IT security and their relationship to security services. We develop a theoretical framework by integrating IT security services pertaining to confidentiality, integrity, authentication, non-repudiation, access controls, and availability of IT systems with the knowledge management categories. The study extends the theory on knowledge management and the importance of maintaining IT security. We conclude the article with the contributions of the framework to theory and practitioners leading to directions for future research. The next section introduces the categories of knowledge management and IT security services. We begin with the definition of knowledge management from previous research. We then provide a discussion of the categories of knowledge management leading to the development of an integrated IT security framework of knowledge management.