Modular Virtualization Platform for Secured E-Commerce Communications
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing security techniques fail to adequately protect users from malware threats while maintaining reliability, resilience, and scalability in e-commerce environments, particularly in online transactions.
Innovation Solution
A modular virtualization platform is implemented for secured communications between a user device and an application server, utilizing a virtual machine client and a peer-to-peer gossip-based state notification process to select a virtualization server based on performance factors, ensuring secure transactions without direct interaction with malware.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Object-affected harmful factors
If strong authentication methods are used to improve security, then malware susceptibility is reduced, but system complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a virtualization server as an intermediary between the user device and application server. This intermediary provides a disposable virtual environment that handles authentication and communication security, shielding the user from malware while managing authentication complexity centrally rather than requiring complex local implementation.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs disposable virtual machines that are created, used, and discarded after each session. These short-lived virtual environments provide secure authentication and communication without persisting anywhere, eliminating the need for complex long-term security infrastructure while maintaining strong authentication through the disposable nature of each virtual instance.
2Object-affected harmful factors
If a virtual computing environment is provided to secure communications, then malware protection is improved, but system reliability may be compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the virtualization infrastructure into multiple independent virtual machines that can be deployed across different physical servers. This segmentation allows continuous operation even if individual virtual machines or physical hosts fail, as the system can migrate sessions to other available instances, thereby maintaining reliability while providing malware protection through virtualization.
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements beforehand cushioning by maintaining a pool of pre-configured virtual machines ready to accept sessions. When a virtual machine becomes unavailable due to failure or maintenance, the system can immediately redirect users to alternative virtual machines without interruption, cushioning against reliability issues while preserving the security benefits of the virtualized environment.
3Device complexity
If traditional security systems are used, then implementation is simpler, but scalability and resilience in e-commerce environments is insufficient
Solution Approach 1:
The virtualization server provides a universal platform that can serve multiple functions: authentication, communication encryption, malware isolation, and session management. This multi-functionality consolidates what would traditionally require multiple separate systems into a single scalable virtual infrastructure, achieving both implementation simplicity and the scalability needed for e-commerce environments.
Solution Approach 2:
The system dynamically allocates and deallocates virtual machines based on real-time demand and system state. Virtual machines can be dynamically migrated between physical hosts, and the system can dynamically adjust security parameters and resource allocation. This dynamic behavior enables the system to scale elastically with e-commerce traffic patterns while maintaining resilience through dynamic failover and load balancing.
Data Source
AI summary
A modular virtualization platform is provided for secured communications between a user device and an application server. A client-side computing device performs secured communications during a virtual session with an application server across a network. The client-side computing device loads a virtual machine client; and selects a remote module to serve as a virtualization server for the virtual session based on one or more performance factors. The virtual session is established with the selected module, and secured communications can occur between the client-side computing device and the application server via the virtual session of the selected module. The performance factors can be collected from a plurality of modules using a peer-to-peer gossip-based state notification process. A route list preferably stores the performance factors for a plurality of modules. The route list can contain pointers to a plurality of remote modules in a plurality of virtualization platforms, to increase reliability.