With the tremendous potential for doing business online, there's a lot of time and money being spent trying to make Internet transactions secure. It's done with a technology called encryption . Encryption software scrambles the data with a secret code so that no one can make sense of it while it's being transmitted. When the data reaches its destination, the same software unscrambles the information. When you see a small lock icon at the bottom of your browser, it indicates that your data will be encrypted during transmission.
Hackers thrive on outsmarting computer security systems.
Many regard breaking into computers as a harmless hobby. If you access the Internet through a dial-up account, the chances of someone breaking into your computer are slim. The real targets of most hackers are corporate and government computers systems. They protect their systems by erecting a firewall , an extra layer of security placed between their internal computers and the Internet. When dealing with online merchants, the best security is common sense.