Archive for Internet Security
Hosting accounts has an access to a shared secure server. Its not really a separate server but the web pages are displayed through an encrypted connection. Every page on a website can be called through this secured server.
Ports and Firewalls
Every computer which accesses the Internet uses ports to communicate. Ports are almost like individual conversations going on over the same telephone line but which each port talking about a different thing.
Every time you access a website using http, the chances are, you’ll be using port 80. For other protocols such as FTP, different ports are used, in this case port 21. Email, secure connections, streaming etc. all use different ports which helps control the flow of data and filter desired information.
Sometimes, a program wants to use an unusual port number and if you have a firewall installed, it may be set to block the port, preventing the program from communicating.
There are two key types of firewall:
Hardware Firewalls are often built into routers and are generally more of an outer barrier preventing any obvious attacks on a system.
Software firewalls are generally more configurable and allow you to choose which programs can access the Internet and individual ports can often be opened or closed down as necessary.
Generally software firewalls have more flexibility than hardware based and have the advantage that they go with you wherever your computer is.
The need for a firewall is only to allow desired programs and information to be sent from your computer. Hackers and malicious code can exploit security holes in a firewall allowing data to be sent. Port scans often detect weaknesses and firewalls help to identify and protect against these.
Hardware firewalls are particularly effective for this. Software firewalls will often alert you if a program wants to access the Internet.
What is the solution to avoid problems with a sitemap file?
One possible solution is not to use any sitemap file at all. In that case, scraper bots can still parse your web pages through the normal links on your web pages but that would be more difficult for them than using your sitemap file.
Another solution is to set up a sitemap file and delete as soon as search engines have indexed that file. Never use free sitemap generator tools. You don’t know what they will do with your data and they might even use it to create scraper sites with your content.
What is sitemaps XML files? Is it harmful for your rankings?
The sitemaps protocols have been introduced by the major search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN, and many other big search engines. A sitemap is an XML file that lists URLs for a site along with additional meta-data about each URL. This information helps the search engines to more intelligently crawl your site. The sitemaps protocol is a standard that makes it easier to create a sitemap that can be parsed by all search engines.
Some search engine spammers used the sitemaps XML files to easily find contents for their scraper sites. A scraper site is a website that pulls all of its information from other websites using automated tools. The scraper software pulls different contents from other websites to create new web pages that are designed around special keywords.
The new sitemaps XML files make it very easy for scraper tools to find content rich pages. Although the original intention of the sitemaps files was to inform search engines about every single page of your web site, they can also be used to inform spam bots about your pages.
IP Address Spoofing
IP Spoofing is a process of returning IP address that is different from the one that is actually assigned to the destination website. To involve in the IP spoofing, the intruders use a variety of techniques to find an IP address of a trusted host and then modify the packet headers so that it appears that the packets are coming from that trusted host.
If a user interacts with dynamic content on that spoofed page, the intruder can gain access to sensitive information on the particular computer or network such as a credit card number or password, or install malware. IP Spoofing is a big no no when in terms of Search Engine Optimization (SEO). With the help of IP Spoofing, newer routers and firewall arrangements can help protect your network from these malicious cloaking and cracking techniques.
Secure Socket Layer (SSL)
The Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) is a high level and commonly-used security protocol for protecting the confidentiality and security of a message transmission on the Internet. SSL is more commonly used by most commerce servers on the World Wide Web for secure transactions.
SSL is an open protocol that has been submitted to several industry groups as the industry security standard and it is denoted by the letters https:// in the URL. Based on RSA Data Security’s public-key cryptography, SSL uses a program layer located between the Internet’s Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) and Transport Control Protocol (TCP) layers.
The “sockets” part of the term refers to the sockets method of passing data back and forth between a client and a server program in a network or between program layers in the same computer.