Syllabus Detail

• Authentication, Encryption. 11 ATAR, 12 GEN

What is data protection?

• Data protection refers to keeping personal and potentially sensitive information safe from unauthorised access
• Protecting our data is essential to ensuring safety and privacy in the IT world
• Authentication and encryption are two methods which allow us to protect and secure data
• For more on the benefits of protecting data and methods of keeping it secure, read The Computing Teacher's article on Data Security

What is Authentication?

Authentication helps to protect our computer systems and data by blocking unauthorized access and control

• passwords
  • type in characters from the keyboard
  • more complex passwords are more secure
  • long passwords are more secure
• biometrics
  • using part of the body to gain access
  • this may replace password access (disneyland example at wikipedia)
  • eg finger print access to a device  (finger print recognition from wikipedia)
  • has two phases. 1. Digitise the information into a database (eg your scanned finger print) 2. Access the device with the digitised information (your finger print) which matches the version in the database.
  • body parts being digitised are scanned by; finger scanner, hand scanner, face scanner, retina scanner and voice scanner
  • finger scanner is the main one being experimented with and used today
• digital signatures
  • making one in Adobe Reader; (first part and last part of this video are worthwhile)
  • this is NOT just copying an image of your signature onto a letter or document
  • this is a mathematical method to keep digital documents or message secure
  • commonly used in banking or any organisation to ensure security
  • computerhope.com gives the following description

    • "A digital signature can be broken down into three parts: A key generation algorithm, a signing algorithm, and a signature verifying algorithm. The key generation algorithm selects a random private key from a set of possibilities and sends the private key with a related public key. The signing algorithm produces a signature based on the message and the private key. Finally, the signature verifying algorithm accepts or rejects the authenticity of the message when provided with the message, signature, and public key."

What is Encryption?

Encryption is to hide the true meaning of some text or numbers. Go to computer hope here and type in some text to see some hidden versions of your text.

• There are now very advanced methods of data encryption using private and public keys.
• It uses both the private key and the pubic key together to encrypt and then decrypt the data
• public key - is available for anyone to use
• private key - is only given to trusted people which can digitally decrypt and format the data so it can be read.
• you can increase security with longer encryption eg eg 32bit could go up to 256bit and it would have a longer encryption variable (much bigger mixture of text and numbers)
• this youtube clip is worthwhile.

BONUS: A tip for passwords

Further Research

• Read Hexistor's guide to protecting your data here
• Read HowToGeek's guide on Encryption here

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Syllabus Detail

• Character, number, date/time, currency, text/string, Boolean (true/false). 11 ATAR, 12 GEN

Background

• A data type lets a computer system know how to deal with each piece of given information
• It applies certain rules and functions when dealing with specific data types
• Each data type contains a different range of values and boundaries
• Data types allow us to keep clean, organised and effective databases

Common Data Types

Further Research

1. Read more about data types across different SQL programs here
2. Read more about data types in programming here
3. Read more from IGCSE ICT here

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Syllabus Detail

• Structure of data warehouses and data marts. 12 ATAR

• Role of data mining. 12 ATAR

• Compare data warehouses and data marts as methods of storage and distribution. 12 ATAR

Structure of Data Warehouse

• A data warehouse is a database or collection of databases that ARE updated (edited 5/617).

• This data is stored for many years.
• The word warehouse is chosen to give the impression of a 'large' area.
• This database or these databases can reside on one server for a company.
• Or it can be on several servers for that company.
• The overall goal of this 'data warehouse' is to store data over a period of time, which is used in data mining.

The Role of Data Mining

• Data mining is used by business.

• They use it find trends which can assist sales, promotions and marketing.
• The use it to identify future planning for the company

Structure of a Data Mart

• A data mart is a small data warehouse usually with data for just one area.

• It is still a database on a server. 
• It is queried by Data Mining software to get valuable trends in data for a company.

As Methods of Storage and Distribution

• (please note this section needs confirmation for accuracy)

• The storage of data warehouses and marts are on servers.

• The distribution occurs by software that analyses the information in the databases.
• There are 100s of these that provide reports offering recommendations for the company based on the query.
• In 2017, these were the top 34 data analysis software. (courtesy of Predictive analytics Today)

Further Research

See this page for more details on Data Warehouses and Data Marts.

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Syllabus Detail

• Purpose and types of validation rules. 12 ATAR

The purpose of Data Validation

• A validation rule verifies that data is entered correctly.
• Validation rule's ensure that data entered in a record matches a specified standard, structure or range of values
• Data validation provides consistent formatting and presentation of information in a database

Examples

• A web form that asks for an email address, won't accept text input unless it has @ in the text
• A password may be rejected because it is too short. Validation states it must be minimum x characters.
• check digit is looking at the last 2 digits in a list of numbers  to confirm numbers are correct. Bar Code readers use this.
• Range check - that the numbers entered fall within an expected range eg month must fall between 01 and 12.

Further Research

• TBA

Worksheet and Practice (yet to be added)

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