Explain the security risks and protection mechanisms involved in website performance

Task 2.2    To meet Pass criterion P3:

All web sites have the potential of being ‘Hacked’ and even the possibility of criminals creating a “look alike” site to "phish" for information which could lead to identity theft or theft of other data such as credit card details.

Research each of these terms (hacking, phishing, identity theft and viruses) and explain each in your own words in pamphlet/report/presentation, suitable for any business that intends to develop an on-line presence.  You must also explain the importance of security protection mechanisms such as firewalls, SSL and strong passwords. You must also include the principles of the Data Protection Act (DPA), and why websites are legally required to comply with the act.[P3]

Hacking-This is where another computer user gains unauthorized  access to your PC or Laptop, this can be for many reasons stealing personal data information. Hackers can use a PC system for many different reasons for using your hard-drives as more storage to legal activity such as a D dos attack if a hacker has control over many systems distributing pornography can be a problem for you and make the polices job allot harder.

Viruses-These come in many forms designed to attack a personal computer and steal password emails personal information or in some cases damage the computer itself by deleting important files. A virus has to be coded and in the coding of the virus it duplicates itself over and over again this can cause many problems such as stopping programs from actually working but not all viruses are designed to cause your system to become so unstable that the computer will not work anymore some viruses are just really annoying as they bring up unwanted sounds text images but the main pain with a virus is they take up storage which could be used for more files and programs.

Phishing-This is a really big problem in the computer world as emails are distributed to people hoping they will submit their personal information mainly banking information. What basically happens is you will receive an email from a look a like bank they could fill in the information style it exactly the same way as an original bank email then it would say such and such like your details need updating with a link sometimes it will be a word  hyper linked to the site or it will be a link that looks official but when you click it you end up on the phishers site

Identity theft-This is where other computer users will get as much information as possible on you and pretend to be you. This is very bad if this happens to you as the thief could run you up a load of bills or commit a crime as you this happens more now because the lack of human interaction with sites and protection. You can prevent this from occurring companies will help with this such as the Federal Trade Commission they offer tips and advice to help secure you from identity theft.

Security protection-This is the most essential piece of software you would need this is firewalls antivirus anti piracy, anti phishing, secure banking allot basically if you are in a high business or company you will need high security. Security this is a major part to a business having high security passwords this means using uppercase lowercase numbers and special characters. SSL is a small padlock that appears on websites when information that is personal or like banking information the padlock represents that the website is secure and is safe.

Data protection act- This was implemented in 1988 to help protect personal information therefore meaning your information cannot be sold or sent to other countries.This applies to websites because sites that store personal records and data have to have full security so that no damage or data loss can occur.

Quick points on the DPA act

.Data must not be acquired and processed unless there a lawful reason to do so.

.Data must be processed within the rights of the person supplying the data.

.Data must only be used for specific and lawful purposes.

.Personal data must be accurate and up-to-date .

.Provision must be made for the correction of data held.

.Suitable measures should be taken to ensure the safety of the personal data.

.Data held should be the minimum required for the purpose and should not be kept longer than is reasonable.

Data is not be transferred to countries outside of the European Economic area.

.

Unit 28 P2 Explain the user side and server side factors that influence the performance of a website

Explain the user side and server side factors that influence the performance of a website

User side:

Cache Memory

Your computer has a storage known as cache memory. Well what is cache memory? Cache memory is what your web browser so like Google Chrome use to load webpages. Why does it do that? Your browser does this for when you revisit a webpage so when you go back to that page again you will notice it speeds up the download time to then furthermore display the webpage. What is bad about this? If you do not turn off your computer very often then the cache memory will fill up and become full this can slow down your computer when trying to access other features or websites in that manner.

Your Broadband internet connection/Download speeds

Lets talk about this easily, your broadband; Sky, BT, Virgin whatever you have can effect your load time to webpages. Well how? Depending on your area will impact how fast your webpages will load on the internet because of the data transfer between you and your ISP (Internet Service Provider). Also depending on what broadband package you pay for can depend on how much data you can download or how fast so your internet speeds this varys from 100mps to 20mbps.The faster the speed the better it is for you to access webpages and the distance too people who live in rural areas will find internet allot slower than people in more populated areas. 

Processor Speeds(performance)

You may be thinking oh why will your computer processor affect webpages? well simply webpages are affected by this because if you have a processor that is not very fast for instance then it will take longer for your computer to complete tasks. The processor is the brain of your computer the lower model of a processor you have so comparing Intel Pentium to Intel i7 processor the difference in speeds will be immense.

Your actual browser

If you are stumbled by this well after this quick explanation you should not be. Your browser lets talk some names Internet explorer, Google Chrome , Safari the list goes on but if your has many addition application built into it for instance extra tool bars this will slow down the user time of loading a webpage as the browser has to run these application within it so your computers performance will be affected as the RAM memory (Random access memory will be filling up with more and more processes this furthermore concludes to that the processor itself explained in the above paragraph will struggle to keep up with that many requests. Upgrading your RAM will help by storing more processes. 

Server side:

Number of hits

If the number of site hits are very high and the servers are very limited you will have a high increased timing trying  to access the selected webpage say for instance a new site pops up and loads of people hit onto that website the response time of the servers would become lower and lower as many users are trying to access the site all at once.  This is so that no damage to the website 

Bandwidth

This is where the company that owns the website has to pay for more data traffic so metaphorically speaking if you had a thin and thick tube and you poured water down both of them the one with the most amount of water pouring out will be better for you, so in technical terms the more bandwidth the better off you are. If you have a small bandwidth 

File types

Bitmap-This file type pixilates when you zoom in on the image, if the servers running the website are not very good the pixilation will look alot worse than what it usually is this means that your number of hits may go down due to users not liking the display of the website.

Vector-These images are smaller in file size and use mathmatical caluculations this therefore meaning that when a user zooms in on the image the imnage does not pixilate in anyway this meaning that a clear image no matter how far you zoom within the image. As they are a smaller file type this means that more of the images can be stored on the website as they take up les smemory space.

Wav-This file type is made up of audio but into chunks of data This wouls affect a website load time as certain chinks of the audio will most certainly be bnigger this could slow down load time for users.

MP3-This is the most common audio file as it is compressed this meaning that if users were to play the file or download it this process would be much faster because of the actual file size itself.