The Ways of How E-commerce Businesses Can Keep Their Customer Data Safe

Posted on 8th September 2023

E-commerce business has drastically changed over the last couple of years, there were lots of factors that influenced it. However, the most obvious one is of course pandemic situation. So many clients now prefer to purchase everything online and the number of virtual shoppers is growing every day. This means businesses should think about implementing new ideas to make the users’ experience safer and more enjoyable.

Managing tons of information about the clients’ orders, addresses, names, and more definitely requires some sort of storage and safety in general. If you as a business owner cannot guarantee safety of the personal data, then you are losing in this huge e-commerce market. Your competitors will win this battle. That’s why, we decided to discuss the major variants of how to change your business strategy in a way.

If you just need one recommendation and don’t have time to read an entire article, then here it is – VPS plans. The right choice of the virtual server is already a data-safe method that works perfectly fine with any e-commerce business.

Secure VPS

To begin with, an e-commerce business has lots of responsibilities because it gathers more personal information than any other type of website. There are so many laws and regulations in each country so the leakage of sensitive data can be a huge trouble and cause some consequences. The most important thing here is to choose a private virtual server. We are not recommending any shared variants, even if you have read lots of positivity about shared hosting.

The most ideal variant will be the choice of a dedicated plan, but if you have a tiny online shop and that sounds pricy for you, then VPS is also a good choice.

Except for data safety, virtual private server usage guarantees better performance, higher speed, the possibility of managing high traffic, and of course root access. High traffic management and better speed are definitely the characteristics that are required for the smooth performance of any e-commerce platform. The more traffic without any issues your site will handle the more satisfied your clients will be. Especially if you have a spike in traffic activity such as during holiday shopping or other various reasons.

Installation of SSL

If the hosting provider company that you are working with is not providing you with SSL Certificate, you can do it yourself. We highly encourage any business owner to install this certificate right away, before you have even started to share login details with the web designers or writers of the site. By doing this, all the information will be immediately encrypted. So, hackers won’t get any clients’ information.

Except for the usage of SSL, also keep in mind that there are a lot of types of these certificates. For instance, Single-domain DV performs encryption for a specific domain and subdomain. The SAN works with the encryption of several domains, mail servers, and IPs. As for Wildcard, it functions by encrypting one domain and its 1st level subdomains. Generally speaking, an average plan for an e-commerce business will be a choice of SAN or Wildcard depending on the peculiarities of the website.

Make regular backups

Controlling whether the regular backups of the system are conducted is crucially important. Usually, everything is made automatically, however, it is still important to double-check everything. For instance, in case of any cyber attack on your platform, you are still getting the smooth functioning of the website and users won’t even notice anything. They will see only an uninterrupted user-friendly interface that works as usual.

Firewall usage

This app is extremely useful for filtering, managing, and blocking any suspicious activities that can be noticeable on your website. You can easily predetermine patterns that a web application needs to accomplish. For instance, it can stop the data flow, limit certain types of files, and even block some coding commands from auto execution.

The firewall is an awesome option, due to the fact that even when cybercriminals in already in the server, this tool still stops any other probable damages that can occur.

Gather minimum information

It is vital in the e-commerce industry that online shops gather all the possible information about purchases, financial details, and addresses. This works as a great option to force your clients to make impulsive decisions and gain more profit for the company. However, in the long run, you will need to store huge amounts of information and control its security.

A good recommendation for any business owner is to collect as little information from the users as possible. In such a way you will face minimal troubles if any leakage of information ever happens on your resource.

To cut a long story short, there are no ideal decisions when talking about data safety. However, by using Firewall, making regular backups, installing SSL, and choosing VPS that matches your requirements, you can greatly increase the level of data security.