SECURITY AND CRYPTOGRAPHY
1. PRIVACY VS. SECURITY
Security is often mistaken as privacy. It is true that, generally speaking, a secure
network connection contributes to the privacy of users who share some content.
The two issues, however, are different. Privacy is a legal issue. Security is a technical
issue. The technical condition is encryption
The concept behind encryption is quite simple – make the data illegible for everyone
else except those specified. This is done using cryptography – the study of sending
messages in a secret form so that only those authorized to receive the message are
able to read it. The easy part of encryption is applying a mathematical function to
something and making it encrypted. The harder part is to ensure that the people
who are supposed to decipher the message can do so with ease, yet only those
authorised are able to decipher it. Internet security deals with encrypted
connections, not encrypted messages.
2. DANGEROUS WEBSITES
It may seem that, as for other functions, the Google system provides a solution
thanks of one of their online tools: a free network tool. The online tool that may
seem able to verify security is the Google Safe Browsing site status. It is not so. The
Google Safe Browsing site status analyses the security of the content of a website.
Content security is different from security.
3. MALWARE AND HACKING
Malware
The attack implemented by Mafiaboy – a story we mentioned when reading Linked –
was based on an infection that Mafiaboy spread in tons of computers. That malware
was designed to start a request for denial of service from tons of computer in a
