The silent war against two brothers, for the security of the WWW!
As technology advances, many elements change, which are transparent for the common user, but for people who manage information traffic within organizations, they are new challenges, which involve, study and greater use of resources; only to try to apply controls to a group, which is increasing.
The growth of communication and the search for a way to reach the end user, it has made many organizations, mostly advertising and social networks, who use services that they were previously only used by entities that required security, such as the banks. But, this type of special protocols, is already at the hands of the community, who unknowingly creates problems, which are not of great importance for large corporations.
Hence, the need arises to control the protocols that use security services, when browsing the Internet. But, the simple fact of trying to control these requests is complex, because they are done in real time and, in large networks, there can be many requests at the same time, all controlled by a single device, which is usually called Firewall.
The common user, what he knows about the Internet, is only what corresponds to the World Wide Web, which is nothing more than the use of a normal Web browser. Currently, new trends have been incorporated, due to the massive use of client services by smartphones and tablets, where the user does not know it, but has made these filters increase. This time, we will focus on what corresponds to browsing sites or pages on the Internet, which is the world of two great brothers, who are causing many worries on the part of the Network Administrators. Keep reading the article and you will see its importance!
HTTP vs HTTPS
When talking about the communication protocols commonly used when browsing the network of networks; We do not even know them, because the application we use, such as: Explorer, Firefox, Chrome, among others; they put them to us automatically. This, because the protocols used are two, and the browser looks for those two options. They are the HTTP communication protocol, which means "Hypertext Transfer Protocol", and the other, HTTPS, which is the "Secure Hypertext Treatment Protocol".
These two brothers, they are the ones that allow and control communication, but they are not just them, there are many other protocols, because when we talk about communication we talk about a stack of protocols, which are studied more specifically through the Layers of the OSI Model. Those we study only control the flow of information, in something called the Transport Layer, which is an area that is responsible only for the control of the data when they are sent to the networks. The difference between the protocols referred to in this article, is simply that one is encrypted and the other is not, that is why we see at the end of HTTPS an "S", which corresponds to security.
A few years ago, most of the websites, using the HTTP protocol, they were very common. The HTTPS was only used when accessing a bank, which by its nature required extreme security. But things have changed and, nowadays, any page uses encryption, such as social networks and even adult content. Everything is transported safely, with its advantages and disadvantages.
Advantages and disadvantages
When we talk about the advantages and disadvantages, there are many for each region; if speaking technically, but simplifying things, we can say, in terms of security: "Our information is safe", which means that when using HTTPS nobody can observe the content of the packets that are communicated between the Client and the Server, and vice versa. This is because when the initial greeting is established, a digital key is created between the two devices, with two being known by them. This encryption created in the communication has as a great disadvantage that the packages get bigger and the navigation is slower. We must choose, whether what is sent to the Internet, requires or does not require security.
When we talk about the other brother, HTTP, traffic enters the two computers that generate communication, does not carry any type of encryption; if there were security, it would be between the applications that interact and not through the transport protocol. The communication would be faster, due to the fact that the packages do not carry any key, they are transported by the network in normal text. What would create a very large security breach, because, if there is any intersection of that traffic, it would have no impediment to be read easily.
The problem in organizations
Before the strong brother, HTTPS, was used by most of the sites, the control in the organizations was simple, a Firewall with medium benefits, that is to say a simple equipment, this one did not have problems at the time of controlling the traffic, because only little processing was required in the transmitted data. Currently, and remembering that, in a large organization, there could be more than five hundred (500) computers, they trying to access the network at the same time, in addition to the decryption of each packet sent to the Internet between client computers and servers, this it would cause a large amount of calculation, requiring more resources for that control, in addition to the expertise of the network administrator.
An example of this is that organizations, previously, these could easily block social networks, such as Facebook or Twitter, because they used HTTP; but currently, almost all, use HTTPS, which causes that the communication can not be read by an intermediary team, such as the Firewall, due to the keys generated. Here, it is where the Administrator's expertise comes in, that he should look for some other alternative to produce control and maintain the optimal functioning of his network.
In conclusion
How it is observed, there is a war between organizations, a war that is transparent for the users of the services, who have no idea of the resources invested, both in computer hardware and software, and in man hours, so that they can have a quality service
Currently, many of the existing firewalls have the ability to control HTTPS, but still require more processing, so that the treatment is transparent. Others have opted to configure their networks so that the keys can be read by the servers and thus manage navigation, since the process is not transparent, because each computer in the network required a special configuration.
But the great conclusion of this particular issue is that until there is no digital awareness in the users of the services, the war will continue. Networks are becoming wider, and are reaching all areas of our daily lives and if we continue to treat things like a game, we could create a security chaos without control.