Q.

1
What Is Electronic Commerce (Ecommerce)?

The term electronic commerce (ecommerce) refers to a business model that allows companies and individuals to buy
and sell goods and services over the Internet. Ecommerce operates in four major market segments and can be
conducted over computers, tablets, smartphones, and other smart devices. Nearly every imaginable product and
service is available through ecommerce transactions, including books, music, plane tickets, and financial
services such as stock investing and online banking. As such, it is considered a very disruptive technology.
Q.2
Introduction:
The term “Electronic commerce” (or e-Commerce) is  use of an electronic medium to carry out commercial
transactions. Most of the time, it refers to the sale of products through Internet.

Definition of E-commerce: Sharing business information, maintaining business relationships and conducting business
transactions using computers connected to telecommunication network is called E-Commerce.

APPLICATIONS OF E-COMMERCE:
The applications of E-commerce are used in various business areas such as retail and wholesale and manufacturing.
The most common E-commerce applications are as follows:

1. Online marketing and purchasing

Data collection about customer behavior, preferences, needs and buying patterns is possible through Web and E-
commerce. This helps marketing activities such as price fixation, negotiation, product feature enhancement and
relationship with the customer.

2. Retail and wholesale:

E-commerce has a number of applications in retail and wholesale. E-retailing or on-line retailing is the selling of
goods from Business-to-Consumer through electronic storesthat are designed using the electronic catalog and
shopping cart model. Cybermall is a single Website that offers different products and services at one Internet
location. It attracts the customer and the seller into one virtual space through a Web browser.

3. Finance:

Financial companies are using E-commerce to a large extent. Customers can check the balances of their savings and
loan accounts, transfer money to their other account and pay their bill through on-line banking or E-banking.
Another application of E-commerce is on-line stock trading. Many Websites provide access to news, charts,
information about company profile and analyst rating on the stocks.

4. Manufacturing:

E-commerce is also used in the supply chain operations of a company. Some companies form an electronic exchange
by providing together buy and sell goods, trade market information and run back office information such
as inventory control. This speeds up the flow of raw material and finished goods among the members of the business
community. Various issues related to the strategic and competitive issues limit the implementation of the business
models. Companies may not trust their competitors and may fear that they will lose trade secrets if
they participate in mass electronic exchanges.

5. Auctions:

Customer-to-Customer E-commerce is direct selling of goods and services among customers. It also
includes electronic auctions that involve bidding. Bidding is a special type of auction that allows prospective buyers
to bid for an item. For example, airline companies give the customer an opportunity to quote the price for a seat on
a specific route on the specified date and time.

6. E-Banking:

Online banking or E- banking is an electronic payment system that enables customers of a financial institution to
conduct financial transactions on a website operated by the institution, Online banking is also referred as internet
banking, e-banking, virtual banking and by other terms. 

7. Online publishing:

Electronic publishing (also referred to as e-publishing or digital publishing) includes the digital publication of e-
books, digital magazines, and the development of digital libraries and catalogs.

8. Online booking (ticket, seat.etc)

An Internet booking engine (IBE) is an application which helps the travel and tourism industry support reservation
through the Internet. It helps consumers to book flights, hotels, holiday packages, insurance and other services
online. This is a much needed application for the aviation industry as it has become one of the fastest growing sales
channels.
Q.3

E-commerce business models can generally be categorized into the following categories.

1. Business - to - Business

A website following the B2B business model sells its products to an intermediate buyer who then sells the product to
the final customer. As an example, a wholesaler places an order from a company's website and after receiving the
consignment, sells the endproduct to the final customer who comes to buy the product at one of its retail outlets.

2. Business - to - Consumer

A website following the B2C business model sells its products directly to a customer. A customer can view the
products shown on the website. The customer can choose a product and order the same. The website will then send
a notification to the business organization via email and the organization will dispatch the product/goods to the
customer.

3. Consumer - to - Consumer

A website following the C2C business model helps consumers to sell their assets like residential property, cars,
motorcycles, etc., or rent a room by publishing their information on the website. Website may or may not charge the
consumer for its services. Another consumer may opt to buy the product of the first customer by viewing the
post/advertisement on the website.
4. Consumer - to - Business

In this model, a consumer approaches a website showing multiple business organizations for a particular service. The
consumer places an estimate of amount he/she wants to spend for a particular service. For example, the comparison
of interest rates of personal loan/car loan provided by various banks via websites. A business organization who
fulfills the consumer's requirement within the specified budget, approaches the customer and provides its services.

5. Business - to - Government

B2G model is a variant of B2B model. Such websites are used by governments to trade and exchange information
with various business organizations. Such websites are accredited by the government and provide a medium to
businesses to submit application forms to the government.

6. Government - to - Business

Governments use B2G model websites to approach business organizations. Such websites support auctions, tenders,
and application submission functionalities.

7. Government - to - Citizen

Governments use G2C model websites to approach citizen in general. Such websites support auctions of vehicles,
machinery, or any other material. Such website also provides services like registration for birth, marriage or death
certificates. The main objective of G2C websites is to reduce the average time for fulfilling citizen’s requests for
various government services.
Q.4

The OSI Model Defined

The OSI Model (Open Systems Interconnection Model) is a conceptual framework used to
describe the functions of a networking system. The OSI model characterizes computing functions
into a universal set of rules and requirements in order to support interoperability between different
products and software. In the OSI reference model, the communications between a computing
system are split into seven different abstraction layers: Physical, Data Link, Network, Transport,
Session, Presentation, and Application.

Created at a time when network computing was in its infancy, the OSI was published in 1984 by
the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). Though it does not always map directly to
specific systems, the OSI Model is still used today as a means to describe Network Architecture.

The 7 Layers of the OSI Model

Physical Layer
The lowest layer of the OSI Model is concerned with electrically or optically transmitting raw
unstructured data bits across the network from the physical layer of the sending device to the
physical layer of the receiving device.

Data Link Layer

At the data link layer, directly connected nodes are used to perform node-to-node data transfer
where data is packaged into frames. The data link layer also corrects errors that may have
occurred at the physical layer.

Network Layer
The network layer is responsible for receiving frames from the data link layer, and delivering them
to their intended destinations among based on the addresses contained inside the frame. The
network layer finds the destination by using logical addresses, such as IP (internet protocol).

Transport Layer
The transport layer manages the delivery and error checking of data packets. It regulates the size,
sequencing, and ultimately the transfer of data between systems and hosts. One of the most
common examples of the transport layer is TCP or the Transmission Control Protocol.

Session Layer
The session layer controls the conversations between different computers. A session or
connection between machines is set up, managed, and termined at layer 5. Session layer services
also include authentication and reconnections.

Presentation Layer
The presentation layer formats or translates data for the application layer based on the syntax or
semantics that the application accepts. Because of this, it at times also called the syntax layer.
This layer can also handle the encryption and decryption required by the application layer.

Application Layer
At this layer, both the end user and the application layer interact directly with the software
application. This layer sees network services provided to end-user applications such as a web
browser or Office 365. The application layer identifies communication partners, resource
availability, and synchronizes communication.
Q.5

2 Types of Data Encryption Techniques

There are several data encryption approaches available to choose from. Most internet security (IS)
professionals break down encryption into three distinct methods: symmetric, asymmetric, and
hashing. These, in turn, are broken down into different types. We’ll explore each one separately.

What is the Symmetric Encryption Method?

Also called private-key cryptography or a secret key algorithm, this method requires the sender
and the receiver to have access to the same key. So, the recipient needs to have the key before the
message is decrypted. This method works best for closed systems, which have less risk of a third-
party intrusion.

On the positive side, symmetric encryption is faster than asymmetric encryption. However, on the
negative side, both parties need to make sure the key is stored securely and available only to the
software that needs to use it.

What is the Asymmetric Encryption Method?

Also called public-key cryptography, this method uses two keys for the encryption process, a
public and a private ksey, which are mathematically linked. The user employs one key for
encryption and the other for decryption, though it doesn’t matter which you choose first.

As the name implies, the public key is freely available to anyone, whereas the private key remains with the
intended recipients only, who need it to decipher the messages. Both keys are simply large numbers that
aren’t identical but are paired with each other, which is where the “asymmetric” part comes in.

Best Encryption Algorithms

AES. The Advanced Encryption Standard (AES)

Triple DES

RSA (Rivest-Shamir-Adleman)

Blowfish. Blowfish is another algorithm that was designed to replace DES.

Two-fish is Blowfish’s successor