Confidentiality in cybersecurity means

The CIA triad — Confidentiality, Integrity, and Availability — is the foundational model in cybersecurity for describing the three core goals of protecting information. Confidentiality is the principle of restricting access to information so that only authorized users or systems can view or use it, preventing exposure to anyone without the necessary permission.

• “Data is accessible only to authorized users” restricts who can view or use the data based on permission — this is exactly what confidentiality protects.

• “Data is accurate” concerns whether data is free from unauthorized alteration or error — this is the property of integrity, not confidentiality.

• “Data is always available” concerns whether data or systems remain accessible for use whenever needed — this is the property of availability, not confidentiality.

• “Data is regularly backed up” describes maintaining backup copies for recovery — this is a backup/redundancy concern and is not one of the three core CIA properties at all.

NIST’s standard glossary defines confidentiality as “preserving authorized restrictions on information access and disclosure.” This matches only the option restricting access to authorized users, confirming it as the correct definition of confidentiality.