Computer Security Fundamentals

As all the PH books in the Security series, this book targets instructors and students using this as a text for a course. The book does place a nice primer down (the main objective)and covers a nice scope on security topics but it certainly doesn’t cover the first coat of “security paint” (no depth). Although it has a 2006 copyright, some identified links are now obsolete (as expected).

I purchased this book to gain/expand/recall “computer security fundamentals” as a practicing ERP system administrator. I am not a student or instructor so have no privy to the solutions to the questions, exercises, and projects provided at the end of each chapter (not even a few). These solutions would greatly reinforce the associated chapter topics. I issued email to the author asking for guidance (how do I know if my answers were correct) using the provided email address and received no response.

So, although I do not consider perusal of this book a waste of time, I do not recommend it to practitioners. Spend your dollars elsewhere on more “Schaum’s Outline” type books.

Rating: 3 / 5

I like the way this book is written, and I like the fact that the chapters are short, since many of my professors seem to like to pile on a lot of reading. The writing style is easy to read, but sadly the book is somewhat outdated, which happens rapidly in this field.

What bothers me greatly is how badly printed this book is. The screenshots are faded out and a bit blurry because it looks like they copied the book rather than printed it. The chapter numbers on the right edge of the pages are partially cut off when you get to chapters with two digits, which happens when you make a copy of a copy. The grays are faded and the book looks like they were running out of toner when they used a laser printer. At this price, the book should be printed using a normal printing process, not some cheap copying method.
Rating: 4 / 5

The book is easy to read and seems like a great resource. Awesome place to start building a knowledge-base.
Rating: 5 / 5

I am using this book for an internet security course. The book is very informative and fairly easy to comprehend from a beginning standpoint. I agree that it includes information that other introductory books do not. This is one text that I will keep for future reference because of its broad scope of information on the important topic of internet security.
Rating: 4 / 5

I teach computer science at a small regional college. I had to review over a dozen different books for our introduction to computer security course. This book is hands down the very best for a beginner. It gives a broad introduction to all aspects of computer security (including some areas other books ignore completely). It also is replete with references, places to look for more information, and practical exercises.

This is the best book for a beginner.
Rating: 5 / 5