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On a recent client project, we were caught between options and had to assess a solution that would be better going forward. From the perspective of cost, manageability, server requirements, and customization potential, we had to consider and implement an e-commerce solution that would be able to sustain a business that generated considerable revenue online.
Shopify was the chosen platform to build on primarily for security. And there were other considerations but security was the core underlying principle. On a later write up, I will discuss the other considerations but for now we will deal with the security decision.
E-commerce website security considerations
When working with e-commerce websites, security is a core thought that forms whether or not investing in an e-commerce website would be a good idea.
All too often e-commerce sites are built without any further considerations as to security, particularly with small businesses. And this is a dangerous way to go about things. And many businesses go down because of this.
When considering the options for the client we were working with, a big issue was security, because if there were any compromises whereby the e-commerce website is hacked, personally this isn’t an issue that I want my clients to face nor I to face. So in assessing the client’s potential and capability in terms of managing future security issues, it was imperative that a solution be put forth that ensured that their business will continue to run. This was a core reason why Shopify was the best option. It is a managed solution and offers a state of the art infrastructure at a manageable cost. As a solution provider, it gave me peace of mind that my client’s website will not suffer debilitating intrusions.
E-commerce Security and compromise prevention
As we have seen from the numerous news reports, hackers are sophisticated enough to implant programs that collect information from a store silently. And so when we build a website we want to ensure that it has the best security available, and unfortunately if you’re managing a Magento install or a WordPress install yourself, you have to be generally knowledgeable above average to implement security firewalls and protocols to ensure adequate protection. Having SSL is just the first step.
Security was a big factor when deciding to move from Magento to Shopify, with Shopify you have a managed infrastructure where a lot of resources are spent on ensuring that the platform is secure with the most up-to-date, state of the art standards. This enables a solution provider like myself to build and develop a clients’ e-commerce business, and then rest assured that it has minimal exposure to intrusions and hacks
Security: PCI compliance and e-commerce integrations
When dealing with PCI compliance and the financial information of customers, this is not something that we want to try to manage ourselves on limited knowledge. Because again a compromise of these things becomes detrimental. The loss of revenue revenue is not only the beginning of our problems when the website is hacked, there maybe also the massive legal obligations that will be pending ones customers realize the issue.
Shopify is well integrated with the most secure payment processing platform on the planet, and that is Stripe. And the various integrations of software necessary for an e-commerce website to work leaves a lot of holes that can be compromised by adept hackers. For these security reasons, Shopify was just a better option.
Magento works too and while the older version of our client’s website was built on Magento, it had reached a point whereby due to age various functions had ceased to function. At this point it was either upgrade Magento from version 1 to version 2, or migrate to Shopify. Reviewing Magento and it’s commercial offering and it’s community offering, and then reviewing Shopify the choice was clear. Simply put, if you have the wherewithal, resources, and time to manage a complex system, Then Magento is an option. And by resources that means capital i.e. money. But, in all use cases, Shopify performs better and at a significantly lower cost.
