Executive Summary
Consumers are spending more money online than ever before. It is compelling retailers to accelerate digital transformation as massive surge in online sales can become a bottleneck for the success of the business. Lightning speed at global scale along with security is extremely important to build a brand image. A retail customer was facing issues with the page load time and secure access to their website content. The website was missing several security headers allowing web content open to malicious attacks. Cloud Solutions Zone utilized Amazon CloudFront distribution, accelerating web access and improving the digital retail experience. In addition, the solution resulted in stronger security and an optimized page load experience.
Customer Challenge: Increasing Security & decreasing page speed time
Rigid website reliability and performance ensure consistent service delivery for retail customers. The rise in security attacks is not only undermining the operational efficiency of businesses, but it is also causing degraded digital retail experience and revenue losses in growth opportunities. Organizations are striving for the best cloud content security and faster web access to attract new customers and retain their clientele. Aberdeen Strategy and Research group reports that a 1 second delay in page load time results in 11 percent lesser page views and 16 percent decrease in customer satisfaction. The loss in user engagement and higher web access response ultimately impact the growth of potential new customers. A secure and responsive website saves valuable time and resources for the retail business that they can spend on improving their customer experience and business performance.
Our Solution: Deploying Amazon CloudFront to securely deliver content with low latency
Originally, the retail client had a simple IT infrastructure as shown below. Amazon Route 53 was directing the web traffic to Load Balancer which was forwarding the requests to the web hosting instances.
Mozilla observatory graded the client’s website “F” before CloudSolutions Zone updated the cloud protection of client’s website, as shown below. The Observatory tests the web content against several factors including but not limited to preventative measure against cross-site scripting attacks, man-in-the-middle attacks, cross-domain information leakage, cookie compromise, content delivery network compromise, and improperly issued certificates.
At CloudSolutions.Zone, we deployed Amazon CloudFront taking advantage of delivering static web content using its worldwide edge locations. In the updated cloud infrastructure, Amazon Route 53 directs the web requests to CloudFront distribution that forwards the requests to Load Balancer.
The CloudFront integration improved the website security by enabling the latest security features including headers. The updated infrastructure was graded “A+” by the Mozilla Observatory. The deployment eliminated the common website attacks leveraging response security headers. Besides, leveraging edge locations, the page speed time was reduced to a few milliseconds. These added features balance their cost fulfilling retail performance expectations and enhancing customer experience.
Business Outcomes
Following the Integration of Amazon CloudFront, our retail client reported a seamless customer experience.
The solution ensured:
- Rigid cloud security with restricted access to private retail data and greater protection against malicious website attacks
- Higher application availability by caching frequent service requests.
- Faster Web access to retail customers around the globe fulfilling performance expectations.
- Set the platform for adding business capabilities for offering personalized content to retail customers and mitigating distributed denial of service(DDoS) attacks
About CloudSolutions.Zone
CloudSolutions.Zone specializes in getting big things done in a small budget.
Connect with Us for integrating cloud strategy into your business strategy. Cloud Solutions.Zone is a Canadian-based cloud consulting service provider for IT solutions. We specialize in sophisticated and challenging cloud system integration projects such as cloud-native applications, cloud security, AI/ML solutions, data migrations, and cyber security solutions.