It goes without saying that the first loophole you need to look out for when designing and developing your E-commerce website is the security aspect of it. Needless to say, when there is a website designed specifically for shopping purposes, malpractices are bound to happen and therefore, you need to be vigil and willing to take protective measures to ensure that your visitors do not fall prey to these hackers and fraudsters. These hackers know exactly as to how they can get access to the information on credit cards and other personal information that e-commerce websites tend to access from their visitors. Therefore, if your e-commerce website is potentially harmful, your visitors will naturally prefer the services and products of your competitors, leaving you in the lurch. However, this does not mean that the information provided by your visitors will always be subject to security threats. With the advancements being made in the field of technology, ensuring that your e-commerce is protected from such harmful threats is now easier than ever. Given below are some tips that will ensure that you provide the best security measures for your visitors.
1.) Develop the e-commerce website on a platform that uses highest standards to ensure security:
You must realize that the first step in developing an e-commerce website is the platform on which it will be developed. Although there is nothing much you can do to customize or alter the security issues on a platform, you do have the authority to select a platform that offers maximum security. Open source e-commerce platforms work well for such purposes. However, this does not mean that you blindly select an open source platform. Once you have narrowed down on these platforms, you need to look out for certain aspects that highlight its ability to deliver top notch security.
The admin panel must be made available only on the internal network. There should be no availability of this panel on public servers. This will ensure that malicious and unauthorized users do not get any kind of access to this admin panel. Apart from this, the open source platform must also provide secondary authentication. This will ensure that only those in the internal network can provide valid information can get access to this network, making it extremely safe and secure.
2.) Make use of Secure Socket Layer for visitors’ data protection:
An SSL, which is short for Secure Socket Layer, is an excellent way to ensure that any data that your visitors send across the network reaches its desired destination safely and without any security threats. An SSL basically encrypts the information that is being sent or received. Encryption of the data does not permit any kind of third party user to get access to such content, keeping all the sensitive information over the network protected.
As a rule of thumb, every page on the e-commerce website that requires visitors to enter sensitive information must be secured using SSL. This implies that a visitor’s account details and the checkout page wherein the actual payment is made must be secured using an SSL. Usually, all the well known open source platforms provide this option and it is very easy to set it up as well. Buying an SSL certificate is also very simple. All the major website hosting companies provide this service and charge for it on a yearly basis.
3.) Increase your security level with varied forms of security options:
Although and SSL certificate guards against any type of malicious practice, you need to ensure that your e-commerce website does not have any security loopholes. For this, you need to ensure that you add several levels of security so that even if a cyber criminal gets through one level, he will have to sweat it out to get access to the other levels. Apart from the SSL, it is wise to have a Firewall installed. It stops the malicious users in their quest to get access to sensitive user information. Therefore, they cannot get access to the network.
To keep your e-commerce website extremely secure, you must also add additional areas in your website that demand login information for pages that are prone to attack by hackers because of its sensitive nature. You could also add contact forms and search boxes and queries for maximum protection.
4.) Frequent PCI scans are a must:
PCI scans are a great way to make you aware of the potential risks and it helps you take corrective steps. You must perform these scans at least every 3 months to keep your e-commerce website secure and updated. Besides, certain third party software like PrestaShop keep coming up with latest versions and updated security measures. You must ensure that you keep pace with these latest versions and run scans on a regular basis.
Author: Jenny is a free lancer writer of http://bigdropinc.com/ and she loves to contribute articles on web design and hacking of E-Commerce sites.
