Vulnerability

Vulnerability is a weakness of the system, data, or any application, by which unauthorized persons can exploit it. Vulnerability on the network may occur due to various reasons:

• Result of a malicious attack
• Failure of a policy
• Weakness of the system or a policy
• Weakness of a protocol

Vulnerabilities are found in operating systems, routers, switches, firewalls, applications, antivirus software, and so on. An attacker uses these vulnerabilities to create a threat to the network. Generally, vulnerabilities arise due to high complexity or human error while developing an application and designing a network.