Large File Transfer and Online Security

As anyone who uses the Internet regularly can tell you, security is an issue. People have been illegally accessing computer networks almost as long as networks have been in existence themselves, and the skills and technologies used to do so have continued to evolve along with the networks themselves.

Hackers who use the information they access for illegitimate/criminal gain (called “crackers” among the hacker community) are a very real threat to individuals and companies of any size: individuals can have their private data accessed, and along with the resulting feelings of helplessness and violation, can have credit card numbers stolen, their computer hijacked as part of a botnet to attack others, or have their identities stolen and used to commit further crimes.

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The situation for companies is at least as bad, as a break in network security can affect many people - the owners, employees, clients and contractors (and others). Loss of financial data, user account information (remember what happened to Winners a year or two ago?), proprietary research results or information, and more are compounded by the costs in time, money and public opinion that can haunt a company for years afterwards.

However, potential risks notwithstanding, people and organizations can’t just disconnect themselves from the Web - not only does it offer a wide variety of tools and benefits, but chances are everyone they know (and most of their clients) are on there. Everybody has a website now, and most companies rely on the Internet not only as a means of finding clients, but of selling them their products or services as well (via e-commerce).

One of the benefits of the Web is the ability to send large amounts of information quickly and easily. Architects, lawyers, insurance underwriters, medical service providers, marketers, musicians and many more no longer need to depend on a slow, unreliable postal service to send (or receive) work from clients, contractors or field personnel - it can all be done online.

But this brings us neatly back to the issue of security: if we don’t want to resort to techniques employed by the CIA since it’s early days (dead-letter drops, armed couriers, etc.) how can we make sure we can send large files (and receive large files!) securely?

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Using a service like FilesDIRECT takes care not only of security issues, but ease-of-use issues as well:

  • Multi-character password creation is in place to help ensure secure account access
  • Use of SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) cryptographic protocol ensures privacy and reliability of large file uploads and downloads
  • 128-bit AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) file encryption is also used to protect against unauthorized access of client files. 128-bit encryption is the encryption standard used by banks and major online retailers (like Amazon.com), and the AES standard has been approved by the US government’s National Security Agency (NSA) for the encryption of classified information
  • Unlike systems like FTP, however, the security features do not impact the user experience - it is very easy to use FilesDIRECT, as the features operate in the background and require no special training or knowledge to use

Combined with robust security on the user end (firewalls, hard-to-guess passwords, etc.), FilesDIRECT can ensure secure file transfer for individuals, professionals and companies in any field.

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