Chapter 11 : Infrastructure For E-Commerce

7/30/2019 Chapter 11 : Infrastructure For E-Commerce

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INFRASTRUCTURE

FOR ELECTRONICCOMMERCE

www.prestonians.webnode.com


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IT TAKES MORE THAN

TECHNOLOGY

Regardless of their basic purpose-B2C or

B2B-virtually all EC sites rest on the same

network structure,communication protocols,web standards, and security systems. This

chapter focuses on the basic hardware and

software infrastructure underlying the millionsof sites used to, sell to service,and chat with

both customers and business partners.



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Tracking United Parcel

Service Shipments The ProblemSince 1907 United Parcel Service (UPS) has been in the

package distribution business It is the worlds largest package distribution company,

transporting over 3 billion parcels and documents eachyear in over 200 countries.

UPS provides the means for customers to track theirshipments to determine the status and whereabouts of a

particular package



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Service Shipments (cont.) In the past, this was done primarily over the telephone

Customers would call UPS with the tracking number of

their shipmentAn operator would look up the status of the shipment in

the UPS database and relay the information to thecustomer

Servicing these calls cost an estimated $2 per call



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Service Shipments (cont.) The Solution

UPS created a Web site (ups.com) that enabled

customers to: track their shipments online

determine the cost and transit time for delivery of a package

schedule a package for pickup

locate the nearest drop-off facility



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Service Shipments (cont.)These online facilities are accessed from the UPS

homepage The customer clicks the Tracking tab at the top of the

homepage

This takes the customer to an online form where the customersimply enters the tracking number and then hits the Trackbutton

The customer receives precise information about the locationof the designated shipment



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Service Shipments (cont.) The front end of the UPS Web site is simple, but the

back-end processing used to handle a tracking

request is more complicatedRequests are handed off to one of a handful of Web

servers

This server passes the request to the appropriateapplication serve



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Service Shipments (cont.)The application server passes the request to an IBM

AS/400 computer attached to the UPS trackingdatabase (the largest transaction database in theworld20 terabytes of data

The mainframe performs the database search for thestatus information

Then it is passed back up the line through the variousservers to the customers browser



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Service Shipments (cont.) The Results

The UPS site services over 4 million online tracking

requests per day It keeps UPS competitive with other shipping companies

that also offer online tracking services and customerinformation (FedEx)



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Service Shipments (cont.)UPS now offers customers the option of tracking their

packages through wireless devices (cell phones, PDAs,and Web-enabled pagers )

Web pages have been modified to support the particularwireless device being used

Specialized servers are used to deliver the pages over

the wireless communication networks



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Service Shipments (cont.)UPS (ec.ups.com) offers a set of e-commerce solutions

and a technology infrastructure that enables other

companies to incorporate UPS online: order entry

Shipping

tracking capabilities

Example:Amazon.com



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Service Shipments (cont.)The company also offers e-commerce tools and

services for managing an enterprises overall supply

chain



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Service Shipments (cont.) What we can learn

There is more to an EC Web site than meets the eye

Behind the scenes of virtually every e-commerce site, anumber of hardware and software components aresupporting these applications


A N t k f N t k


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A Network of Network

The internet is a network of thousands of inter connected

networks .Included among the interconnected networks are: The interconnected backbones that have international reach.

A multitude of access/delivery subnetworks are provided bythe local and regional Internet service providers(ISPs).

Infact, the request and response are each broken intopackets, and the packets can follow different paths.

The paths traversed by the packets are determined by

special computers called routers. The routers haveupdateable maps of the networks on the internet that enablethem to determine the paths for the packets.



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ISP

NAP

ISP ISP

NAP

NAP NAP

ISP

ISP

ISP

ISPISPISP

ISP

INTERNET NETWORK ARCHITECTUREwww.prestonians.webnode.com


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INTERNET PROTOCOL

A protocol is a set of rules that determines howtwo computers communicate with one another over

a network.The protocols around which the internet

was designed embody a series of design principles.

Interoperable

Layered

Simple

Endto-End



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TCP/IP The protocol that solves the global internetworking

problem is the Transmission Control Protocol/InternetProtocol(TCP/IP).

The TCP ensures that two computers can communicate

with one another in a reliable fashion.Each TCP

communication must be acknowledged in a reasonabletime, then the sending computer must transmit the data.

In order for one computer to send a request or a

response to another computer on the internet, the

request or response must be divided into packets that

are labeled with the addresses of the sending and

receiving computers.This is where IP comes into play.

The IP formats the packets and assign addresses.www.prestonians.webnode.com


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Application Layer

FTP,HTTP,Telnet,NNTP

Transport Layer

Transmission

Control Protocol

User Data gram

Protocol (UDP)

Internet Protocol

(IP)

Network Interface Layer

Physical Layer

FIG:TCP/IP

A

R

C

H

IT

E

C

TU

R

E



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DOMAIN NAMES

Names like www.microsoft.com, which referenceparticular computers on the internet, are calledDomain Names. Domain Names are divided intosegments separated by periods.

When users wishes to access a particularcomputer, they usually do so either explicitly orimplicitly through the domain name not the

numerical address. The domain name is converted to the associated

numerical address by a special server called thedomain name server.

http://www.microsoft.com/http://www.microsoft.com/


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INTERNET CLIENT/SERVER

APPLICATION As the name suggests, in a client/server application there

are two major classes of software:

Client software, usually residing on an end users desktop

and providing navigation and display. Server software, usually residing on a workstation or

server-class machine and providing back-end data accessservices (where the data can be something simple like a

file or complex like a relational database.



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NEW WORLD NETWORK: INTERNET2 AND

NEXT GENERATION INTERNET(NGI)

The current data infra structure and protocols theintranetare capable of handling todays internettraffic but not for so long. Two consortiums, as wellas various telecoms and commercial companies likeCisco, are in the process of constructing the newworld network. It will be capable of dealing with the

next generation of internet applications, which willbe multimedia laden.



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NEW WORLD NETWORK: INTERNET2 AND

NEXT GENERATION INTERNET(NGI) Just as the original internet came from efforts

sponsored by NSF and DARPA ,it is assumed

that the research being done to create bothInternet 2 and the NGI will ultimately benefit thepublic internet. While they will certainly impactthe bandwidth among the ISPs,IAPs, and

NAPs,it still does not eliminate the barriersacross the last mile to business and homes.



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WEB-BASED CLIENT/SERVER

The vast majority of EC applications are web based. Insuch applications, the clients are called web browsersand the servers are simply called web servers, like otherclient/server application s,web browsers and servers

need a way To locate each other so they can send requests and

responses back and forth and

To communicate with one another . To fulfill these needs,

a new addressing schemethe URL and a newprotocol the HyperText Transport Protocol (HTTP)were introduced.



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WEB-BASED CLIENT/SERVER (cont.)

HYPERTEXT TRANSPORT PROTOCOL When users navigate from one page to the another by clicking on

hypertext links within a page.when a user does this, a series of

actions takes place behind the scenes.First, a connection is made

to the web server specified in the URL associated with the link.Next, the browser issues a request to the server, say to GET the

web page located in the directory specified by the associated

URL. The structure of the GET request is simply GET url(e.g.,

GET www.ge.com). The server retrieves the specified pageand returns it to the browser .

http://www.ge.xn--com%29-yi0c.the/http://www.ge.xn--com%29-yi0c.the/http://www.ge.xn--com%29-yi0c.the/http://www.ge.xn--com%29-yi0c.the/


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WEB BROWSER

The earliest versions of the web browsers-Mosaic,Netscape1.0,and Internet Explorer 1.0 were truly

thin clients. Their primary function was to display

web documents containing text and simple graphics.

Today, the two major browsers in the market

Netscape communicator4.0 and Microsofts Internet

Explorer 5.0 (IE 5.0) are anything but thin , both

offering a suite of functions and features.



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WEB SERVER

A web server is not a hardware platform;it is a softwareprogram. In the UNIX world this program is called an http

daemon. In the windows NT world the program is known as an

http service. The primary function of all of these programs is to

service HTTP requests. In addition, they also perform the

following functions :

Provide access control on the web server.

Providing real time access to databases and other dynamic

data.This is done through various application programming

interfaces . Enable management and administration of boththe server functions and the contents of the website .

Log transactions that the users make.



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COMMERCIAL WEB SERVER

While there are dozens of web servers on themarket, three servers predominate;

Apache server

Microsofts internet Information Server (IIS)

Netscapes Enterprise Server.



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WEB SERVER USAGE SERVEY

Since late 1995, a company called Netcraft

(www.netcraft.com) has been conducting monthly

surveys to determine the market share of the

various servers (by numbers connected to theinternet). This is done by polling known web sites

with an HTTP request for the name of the server

software.

Table shows the survey results for selectedmonths beginning in January 1996 and ending in

January 1999.

http://www.netcraft.com/http://www.netcraft.com/


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Table: NETCRAFT SURVEY OF WEB SERVER

MARKET SHARE (Ns IN Millions)

server january1996 january1997 january1998 january1999

N=74 N=646 N= 1,835 N=4,062

Apache 19.7% 41. 4% 45. 4% 54. 2%

Microsoft IIS 0. 0% 7.7% 20.7% 23. 4%

Netscape 12. 4% 9. 9% 5. 5% 4. 2%

OReilly website 3. 8% 2. 3% 2. 2% 1.7%

NCSA 35. 7% 10. 8% 3. 8% 1. 2%



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INTERNET SECURITY CORNERSTONES OF SECURITY: Security is often cited as a major barrier to EC, prospective

buyers, for example, are leery of sending credit card

information over the Web. Prospective sellers worry that

hackers will compromise their systems.while the need for

security breaches. The National Computer SecurityAssociation (NCSA) has identified four cornerstones of secure

EC, Included are:

Authenticity

Privacy.

Integrity.

Non repudiation.



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ENCRYPTION One way to ensure the confidentiality and privacy of

messages is to make sure that even if they fall into thewrong hands they cannot be read. This is where

cryptography comes into play. All cryptography has four

basic parts:

Plaintext- the original message in human-readable. Cipher text- the plaintext message after it has been

encrypted into unreadable form.

Encryption algorithm- the mathematical formula used to

encrypt the plaintext into cipher text and vice versa. Key- The secret key used to encrypt and decrypt a message.

Different keys produce different cipher text when used with

the same algorithm.



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ENCRYPTION Cryptography enables not only text but also binary

information - video, sound,and executable softwaremodules- to be encrypted for secure transmission across

the internet.

Synchronous Private Key Encryption



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ENCRYPTION

Public key of recipient Private key of recipient

Public key Encryption

Message

textCiphered

text

Message

textencryption

decryption

Sender Receiver



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ENCRYPTIONSession Public Key

Key of Recipient

Digital Envelope

Session Key Session Key

Message

Text

Ciphered

TextMessage

TextEncryption

Decryption

Sender

Session

Key

Receiver

Private Key

of Recipient



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DIGITAL SIGNATURES: AUTHENTICITY Digital signatures are based on public key encryption. Theuse of a digital signature is illustrated in figure. The basic

idea is that messages encrypted with a private key can onlybe decrypted with a public key.

This phrase is then attached to the message and the

combined message is encrypted with the recipients publickey. Upon recipient, the message is first decrypted with therecipients private key. The signature phrase is decryptedwith the senders public key. If the phrase is successfullydecrypted, then the recipient knows that the message could

have only been sent by the holder of the senders privatekey. Of course, at this point there is no guarantee that thesender is actually the sender. It could be someone who hasstolen the private key. This is where digital certificates comeinto play.


Private Key


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MESSAGETEXT

MESSAGETEXTCIPHER

TEXTSignature Signature

Private Key

of Sender

Public Key

of Sender

Encryption Decryption

ReceiverSender

Public Key

of Recipient

Private Key

of Recipient

Digital Signaturewww.prestonians.webnode.com

DIGITAL CERTIFICATES AND CERTIFICATE


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DIGITAL CERTIFICATES AND CERTIFICATE

AUTHORITIES (CAs) Digital certificates verify that the holder of a public and private

key is who they claim to be. The structure of a digital certificate

is governed by the IETFs X .509 standard.

Digital certificates are issued by third parties called certificate

authorities (CAs).

Individuals or companies apply for digital certificates by

sending the CA their public key and identifying information.

The CA uses their private key to encrypt the certificate and

sends the signed certificate to the applicant.

The sender uses the CAS public key to decrypt the certificate.

In this way the sender can be more confident of the true identity

of the recipient .



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DIGITAL CERTIFICATES AND CERTIFICATEAUTHORITIES (CAs)

After decrypting the certificate, the sender uses the embedded

public key to encrypt the message. In this way, the only public

key that the sender really has to know ahead of time is the CA

public key.



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SECURE SOCKET LAYER

Secure socket layer is a protocol that operates at the TCP/IP

layer. This means that any application that relies on TCP/ IP

SUCH AS THE Web (HTTP) , Use Net newsgroups (NNTP), and e-

mail (SMTP) can be secured by SSL. Secure socket layersupports a variety of encryption algorithms and authentication

methods . The combination of algorithms and methods is called

a cipher suite. When a client contacts a server, the two negotiate

a cipher suite, selecting the strongest suite the two have incommon.



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SECURE ELECTRONIC TRANSACTION A Cryptographic protocol that is designed to handle the

complete transaction is secure electronic transaction (SET),which was jointly developed by visa.

The SET protocol provides authentication,confidentiality, message integrity,and linkage, and it relies on public and private keys for the consumer andthe merchant and supports the following features.

Cardholder registration. Debit card transactions.

Credit reversal.

Merchant registration.

Purchase requests.

Payment authorizations. Payment capture.

Charge backs.

Credits.



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Firewall: ACCESS CONTROL

A firewall is a network node consisting of both hardware and software that

isolates a private network. There are two basic types of firewalls: dual-

homed gateway and screen-host gateway.

In a dual-homed gateway a special server called the bastion gateway

connects a private internal network to the outside internet.

With a screen-host gateway a network router is used to control access to

the bastion gateway. The router ensures that all inbound traffic must pass

through the bastion gateway. A popular variant of the screened-host is the

screened subnet gateway in which the bastion gateway offers access to asmall segment of the internal network. The open subnet is known as the

demilitarized zone. The idea behind the screened subnet is that there is no

way for outside traffic to gain access to any of the other hosts on the

internal network.



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LOCAL

NETWORK

BASTIONHOST

Internet

ProxiesFTP,HTTP,

NNTP,Telnet

FIGURE: Bastion Host Gatewaywww.prestonians.webnode.com

Web server


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INTERNET

Router Router

Bastion host

Local

Network

FTP Server

ProxiesFTP,HTTP,NNT

P,Telnet

FIGURE: Screened Subnet Gatewaywww.prestonians.webnode.com

VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORKS


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VIRTUAL PRIVATE NETWORKS Suppose an enterprise wishes to provide mobile or remote

workers with secure access to enterprise data that is normally

accessed over a LAN.Traditionally, remote and mobile workersaccess this data through a bank of modems or a remoteaccess server (RAS) that allows them to dial in over phonelines to the LAN. The chance of caves dropping on thetransmission is nil, but it is an expensive way to do businessbecause of the long distance phone charges that are incurred.A less expensive alternative is a virtual private network(VPN).

VPN combines encryption, authentication, and protocoltunneling to provide secure transport of private

communications over the public Internet. It is as if the Internetbecomes part of a larger enterprise WAN. In this way,transmission costs are drastically reduced because workerscan access enterprise data by making a local call into an ISPrather than a long- distance call.



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Selling on the WEB Functional requirements

The TCP/IP, web browsers, commercial web

servers, encryption, and firewalls provide anopen foundation for creating web site that caneasily support marketing and service activities.

They provide an infrastructure for conductingbusiness online.



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Selling on the WEB

Just like their physical counter parts, online store must provide themeans: Discover, search for, and compare products for purchase;

Select a product to be purchase and determine its total price; Place an order for products; Confirm order, or ensuring that the desire product is available; To pay for products; To verify credit To process order To verify shipment; Provide feedback to the seller



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ELECTRONIC COMMERCE SOLUTIONS:

OUTSOURCING VERSUS INSOURCING

Like traditional merchants, web merchants

have a number of options for creating andoperating their electronic storefronts. Thereare threes types of providers who offer

services for creating and operating anelectronic storefront.



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OUTSOURCING VERSUS INSOURCING1. Internet malls:

There are 3,000 or more malls on the web, like a real worldmall.

An internet mall consist of a single storefront entry to acollection of electronic storefront.

Internet malls come in a variety of shapes and size. There areregional malls like South Florida's (www.sf-mall.com), speciallymalls like the Golf Mall (www.golf-mall.com), and generalpurpose malls like Choice Mall (www.choicemall.com) .

http://www.sf-mall.com/http://www.golf-mall.com/http://www.choicemall.com/http://www.choicemall.com/http://www.golf-mall.com/http://www.golf-mall.com/http://www.golf-mall.com/http://www.sf-mall.com/http://www.sf-mall.com/http://www.sf-mall.com/


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2. Internet service providers:

In addition to providing internet access to companies andindividual users, a large number of ISPs offer host services forEC.

For the most parts of ISPs are focused on operating a securetransaction environment.

This task can be outsourced by third party.

A listing of top site designers can be found at

www.internetworld.com . Some of the national ISPs like UUNet have begun offering more

complete EC solution.

http://www.internetworld.com/http://www.internetworld.com/


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3. Telecommunication companies: Increasingly the large telecommunication companies have

expanded their hosting services to include the full range of EC

solutions. Network service provider NSP, one of the private companies

maintaining and servicing the Internets high-speed backbones.

Include among the companies are MCI, sprint, UUNET/MIS,

PSINet, and BBN planet



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Electronic Catalogs and merchant

servers. Electronic catalogs presentation of information about

products (services) that traditionally were in paper catalogs. However, electronic catalogs include multimedia such as

voice clips. An electronic catalog contain

written descriptionsphotos of products along with information about various

promotions, discounts,payment methods and methods of delivery.



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Electronic Catalogs and merchant

servers. Electronic catalogs and merchant server allow businesses to

create simple, straight forward electronic storefronts. For morecomplex operations, a number of vendors offer EC suite that

support most stages of the supply and buying chains. Electronic commerce suites offer merchants

Greater flexibility

Specialization

Customization Integration in supporting complete front and back-office

functionality.



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Chatting on the web.

Online forum and chat group technologies offer a variety ofbusiness opportunities.

Chat groups involving customers and helpline staff are one

way of offering enhanced customer services. Communication centers:

Virtual meeting places can be created and fees charged forparticipation.

One example is Match. COM (www.match.com) , web chat broadcasting system (www.wbs.com) , contain 200 chat rooms.

http://www.wbs.com/http://www.wbs.com/


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Chatting on the web.

Customer services:

A number of customer services site now offer online

support where customers can converse with help linestaff and other customer.

Most online support center are organized as forums

rather than chat groups.

There are some exceptions Merchant

(www.intersolv.com/csupport/index.asp) .

http://www.intersolv.com/csupport/index.asphttp://www.intersolv.com/csupport/index.asp


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Multimedia delivery. The way in which audio, video and other multimedia content are

being delivered over the internet are Web casting:

Web casting is a term used to describe internet-based broadcasting of audio and video content.

One of the leading arena is Real Networks.& Web casting ranges from simple text streams; to periodic

transmission of webcam images; to low quality audio andanimation; to high end CD quality audio; and full motion, fullscreen video.



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Bandwidth

The major barrier to widespread participation in in Web cast isbandwidth.

Bandwidth refers to the speed with which content can be delivered.

Most consumer connect to the internet over the telephone throughmodems whose speed range from 14.4 kbps to 56 kbps (kilo byte persecond).

Most consumer connect to the internet using lower speed modems. Soon this will change as the cable television and telephone

companies battle for the privilege of wiring homes with internetconnections.



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Internet telephones:

Internet phones are not a real telephones they areprogram that let you talk with other people using theinternet.

The main attraction of internet telephones is cost,depending on the type of internet phone connections.

Internet phones comes in three versions---PC-to-PC, PC-to-Phone, and Phone-to-Phone.



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Internet telephones:

With PC-to-PCinternet phones call, the caller and recipient areboth required to have the same internet phones software on theircomputers.

PC-to-Phone system only require the caller to have the internetphone software. The recipient answer the call with a regulartelephone.

Phone-to-Phone, the caller and the recipient use a regular

telephone.

Documents

Chapter 11 : Infrastructure For E-Commerce