The rapidly changing nature of technology and communications has led to the World Wide Web and E-Commerce being labeled the future of business. However as standards in technology rise and the progress of the 'Information Age' increases, so do society and the media's paranoia towards a computer-controlled world.

It appears that for every media report of a great new advancement in E-Commerce, there are three or four more relating to the closure of an 'E-Company' or the breakdown in security of a major Internet corporation.

High profile examples include the report last March on Amazon.com,

"Intruders had access to customer credit details for four months at site owned by world's biggest e-tailer".

These kinds of reports have led to talk in the electronic business sector that their future is far from secure if they are unable to calm the fears of the average person.

It seems fair to say that much of the fears arise from the early days of commercial exploitation of the WWW where investors, realizing the potential, rushed into the market with no previous experience and quickly found themselves in difficulties.

With every new form of media, be it TV, radio, or the World Wide Web, comes a whole range of detractors, and where there is money involved, these negatives are only ever emphasised. Current computer technology does show that the future is open to exciting new ways of doing business and therefore can only reduce the fears that inevitably come with change.

The most widely used form of security is Netscape's 'Secure Socket Layer' or 'SSL Protocol'. It uses the standard PKI (Public Key Infrastructure) to transfer private information (e.g. credit/debit card details) from the client i.e. the customer, to the server, or seller. This application has become standard in most e-business tools and is said to provide the most safety to customers and businesses. Click here for a more complex guide to SSL

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