Hi,
I must admit I don’t know too much about security in general, but my friends and I are mystified by something someone we know is claiming.
She has joined broadband service “X” (I don’t want to say who unless it’s really important). She says the engineer who came to her house confided in her that X is “the least secure of all the broadband providers” and that “websites like ebay and amazon have beefed up their security lately with new technology and the X network is too outdated to handle it properly”.
Now us 3 geeky types are completely confused. We have tried to ask questions to understand what she could mean. If she is right then surely that would be something anyone concerned with web security should know (I do design websites and obviously have one of my own, although I’m no security expert).
The possibilities I could think of were (in no special order):
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he was talking about a browser that comes with the service. She mentioned AOL (although that’s not the broadband provider) and I picked up on that and queried if he maybe meant the AOL browser. We are used to security holes in browsers (thinking of IE). Unfortunately my friend doesn’t understand the difference between a browser, an operating system and the internet, so this line of enquiry got nowhere.
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he was talking about wireless router security and encryption keys etc. I know some networks are notorious for using the same default passwords for everyone or perhaps their routers are out of date (using WEP for example). But if that’s the case she shouldn’t worry because she has bought her own brand new router anyway, and between us we could help her set it all up properly. However, provider X recently won an award for the security that they have on their wireless routers, so it’s probably not that.
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something to do with https? But that’s not “new technology”. And I’m hazy on the details but I thought the point was that the packets of data were encrypted. Then I remembered “secure sockets” and wondered if there was somewhere other than the server and the client where there could be a security hole. I know I should know all this, but it’s not something I’ve thought about in ages (none of the sites I have been working on lately need so much as a login form, and I’ve been up since 3am anyway).
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some kind of crazy newfangled html5 webby stuff? No, I can’t think why. But it’s “new technology”.
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something to do with ajax. She did mention “speed”. But no “broadband provider” is going to be THAT slow are they? And ajax is just a method of doing things. And it’s not really “new technology”. Security holes would be down to vulnerabilities in the script rather than the broadband provider’s technology, wouldn’t they?
Look I know this is really vague and no, it probably makes no sense whatsoever. There’s obviously a chance that this “engineer” was talking rubbish. But my friend is now CONVINCED that this must be absolutely true and her broadband provider is rubbish and really “insecure”.
Does anyone out there know of ways in which the broadband provider can affect website security (in the sense of a user making online purchases, not in the sense of someone hacking your website per se)??? Other than dodgy old routers with out of date wireless encryption or dodgy out of date browsers?
It seemed to me like this was actually something worth knowing if she is right.
Sorry for being so fluffy about all this but this has 3 of us stumped, all with different experience and expertise. 
If anyone can make any sense out of “new technology” “increased security” and “no point because my broadband provider is so out of date and insecure” we would love to hear it. Even if it’s only a guess … !
