"All parties in the e-commerce chain realized that the real problem with online transactions was not security [getting the data securely from point A to point B]; rather, the problem was authenticating that the person entering the credit card details was indeed the real cardholder." G. Knapp 2001, "Standards rise to combat e-commerce fraud", Image and Data Manager, November / December, p.6

As the internet has evolved into a global information market, so has the will of hackers to gain access to that information. In the early 70s, the ARPANET (which was later to become the Internet) had no security measures, since the ideology behind the net was focused on information sharing. As the internet began to be used for commerce and government, the linked computer systems had to be protected against unauthorized access and information leakage, yet even nowadays no computer connected to the net is 100 percent secure.

This project is a study of the evolution of various attack methodologies and combat strategies, starting from the mid 80s to the present day.

Investigator: Alex Kulikov (MSc thesis)