How secure is my web site or application? This is a very legitimate question, one which we can definitely help you with. Your web site or application can be as secure as a standard console or Windows application. There are two different scenarios your web application may fall under, an internal application or an external application.

 

The first line of defense for your web application is it's own security. In most cases your web application will require it's users to log into it's system, normally using a username and password. This security is solely dependant on the web application itself. If your web application is not requiring a login, and it recognizes you as a valid user, then chances are your web application is integrated with your network's existent security. If you're not sure, ask your IT staff, or contact us for help.

 

If you are hosting your web application internally, on one of your servers, security is a little easier. In most cases, your existing network infrastructure is securing your application along with the rest of your data and infrastructure. Your network should have firewalls, access policies, scanners, etc. to keep your network secure. If you're unsure on whether or not your network is secure check out our network evaluation options.

 

An internal application can be published for external access, for example allowing your sales reps access to your sales application or customers access to your inventory list. Though it's published for external access, it doesn't mean anyone can access it. Your application's security and logins will still apply to external users so strangers might be able to view the login but they cannot access any of your data.

 

Web sites that are customer-centric, allowing customers and visitors access to the site, are normally hosted on a public web server accessible to anyone on the world wide web. The applications first line of defense is it's own security, as stated before. Another security issue is the data center the application is hosted in. Most data centers manage firewalls, advanced monitoring and more to ensure top level security for their customers.

Whether you're publishing your internal web application externally or you are hosting your application externally, and your web application contains sensitive information, we highly recommend using an SSL certificate to encrypt the traffic. With an SSL certificate the data between your server and the user's computer is encrypted, virtually impossible to hack. This is important because your external users could be sitting at a café or another public location sharing the same connection with other users. Any one of the other people could be snooping on the network receiving all of the data that your server and your sales rep are transferring back and forth. Now a third party has sensitive sales information, account details, even billing information. Using an SSL certificate encrypts all of the data between your user and your server so anyone snooping will only received garbled letters, unreadable.

 

Delphi offers SSL certificates from www.InstantSSL.com, Contact our sales department for competitive pricing!