Computer Science

Cambridge, IGCSE
Chapter 2 – Communication and Internet Technologies
Communication and Internet Technologies
Learning Objectives
• What is meant by transmitting data and
• Serial and Parallel transmission
• Simplex, duplex and half-duplex transmissions
• Different methods of error checking and error detection
• Security risks when using the internet and how to minimize
• How antivirus and protection software help to protect a User from security
risks
• The role of the internet browser and ISP (internet service provider)
• HTML structure and presentation and HTML and hypertext transfer
protocol
• Concepts of MAC addresses, IP address, URL and cookies

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Data Transmissions
• How does it occur
• The transfer of data occurs either wirelessly by radio waves or over a cable
(fibre optic cable or copper twisted wire)
• The data is transmitted as a stream of bits
• The rate at which the transfer of data occurs is called the bit rate : the number
of bits that can be transmitted in a given period of time (bps – bits per second
or Mbps - mega bits per second)
• Obviously the higher the Mbps, the quicker the transmission

• 2 types of transmission: Serial or Parallel

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Serial data transmission
• Uses a single wire to transfer the data bits
• Cheap and can transmit data over long distances (+/- 100m)
• Bits are transmitted sequentially, one bit at a time – there is a set
time interval between sending each bit
• The time interval depends on the speed of the transmitting and
receiving devices e.g. 56K modem can transmit 57 344 bits per
second

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Parallel data transmission
• Uses several wires to transfer the data bits simultaneously
• With 8 wires, 1 byte (8 bits) can be transmitted all at once
• Transfers data quicker than serial transmission
• However is more expensive (more wires/cables) and therefore limited
to shorter distances
• The bits are sent over multiple wires simultaneously. All bits are
received at the same time
• Because of the multiple wires, interference can occur between them
– another reason why its use is generally limited to short distances
(+/- 5m)

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Serial vs parallel data transmission uses
• Serial data transmission examples
• High-speed USB, universal serial bus, used to transmit data to printer
• USB to connect electronic devices to a computer e.g. our smart phone to computer;
Also used to connect keyboard and mouse to computer
• We use a USB cable that will have a USB plug
• The USB plug plugs into a USB port on our computer
• Parallel data transmission examples
• Integrated circuits (IC) or microchips, where low cost, simplicity and speed are
important factors
• Used in Microwaves and washing machines
• Being built into devices means little chance for interference to occur
• Device can be controlled very quickly through the use of parallel transmissions

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Serial vs Parallel data transmission Summary
Serial Transmission Parallel Transmission
Used over long distances Used over short distances
Uses a single wire Uses multiple wires
Reduced cost as only single wire needed Increased cost as multiple wires needed
Slower transmission – transmitted one bit at a time Quicker transmission as data is sent simultaneously
over single wire over multiple wires
Safer transmission as its easier to put the data back Less safe as bits are sent simultaneously and errors
together again on the receiving end can occur in putting the data together on the receiving
end

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Direction of serial and parallel data
transmission
• Data can be sent in various directions between the sending and
receiving device (whether in serial or parallel mode)

• Simplex transmission – data sent in one direction only

• Full duplex transmission – data sent in both directions simultaneously
• Example a telephone conversation, where both parties speak at the same time
• Half duplex transmission – data sent in both directions, BUT only in one
direction at a time
• Example a walkie-talkie (2-way radio) – only one person can speak at a time by holding
down the talk button to speak, then releasing it for the other person to talk

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Direction of serial and parallel data
transmission examples
• Different methods of data transmission can be combined
• A modern network uses serial full duplex transmission
• A walkie-talkie uses serial half duplex transmission
• A mouse uses serial simplex transmission

• You can also get the following types of data transmissions:

• Parallel simplex
• Parallel duplex
• Parallel half duplex

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Error detection and correction
• Errors can occur when transmitting and storing data
• We use methods of error detection and error correction to increase
the accuracy and reliability of the data
• Methods
• Checksum – the number of bits being transmitted is counted up and this
number is transmitted with the data. The receiver then checks if the number
of bits received matches the number sent with the data
• Parity check – uses the 8th bit of a byte as the parity bit (the 7 bits are used for
the data)
• 2 types of parity checks: Odd parity or Even parity
• For even parity, the 8th bit is used to make sure the count of bits is even
• For odd parity, the 8th bit is used to make sure the count of bits is odd

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Error detection and correction
• Parity checks
• The devices that the data is being transmitted between is set to check for odd
or even parity before the data is sent
• It’s a simple and effective method of error detection
• However it cannot detect if disturbance has affected a byte that would still
have the same odd or even calculation, but the bits themselves have changed
• Parity checking is also used on data that is stored as well as data that is
transmitted

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Error detection and correction - ARQ
• (Automatic Repeat reQuest) A set of protocols for handling
communications errors in which the receiving station requests
retransmission if an error occurs.

• Stop-and-Wait ARQ The sender waits for an acknowledgment (ACK) before sending
the next frame. If the sender does not receive an ACK within a certain amount of
time, or if it receives a not-acknowledged (NAK) message, the frame is retransmitted.

• Go-Back-N ARQ Multiple frames are sent, and the sender waits for all frames to be
acknowledged. If there is a NAK for any frame, or if there is no ACK for all the frames,
the entire set is retransmitted.

• Selective Repeat ARQ Similar to Go-Back-N ARQ, except that only the frame that did
not receive an ACK is retransmitted.

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Error detection and correction- Check Digit
• When transmitting data, errors may occur, and some data may be incorrectly received. To overcome this, an extra value is
transmitted to help determine if the data received is correct or incorrect. This value is known as a check digit.
• The value of the check digit is usually calculated from the other data being sent. For example, the EAN8 barcode number system
creates the check digit from the other seven numbers in the bar code:
• The first, third, fifth and seventh numbers are each multiplied by three, and then added together.
• The remaining numbers are added to the total.
• The total is divided by ten.
• The check digit is determined by subtracting the remainder from ten.
• Example - barcode 2142345
• This would give (3 × 2) + (3 × 4) + (3 × 3) + (3 × 5) = 6 + 12 + 9 + 15 = 42
• 42 + 1 + 2 + 4 = 49
• 49 ÷ 10 = 4 remainder 9
• 10 - 9 = 1
• Check digit = 1

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Security aspects when using the Internet
• There are various security issues that can be encountered when using
the internet
• The internet itself is a fairly insecure way of transferring data, so
security has become a top priority for the everyday user as well as
businesses and governments
Security issues can arise for many reasons
• When downloading a file
• Entering data through a web form
• Sending data via email
Can you think of any additional reasons?
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Security aspects when using the Internet
• Good internet security is necessary to protect your personal details,
financial details and transactions, as well as protecting your
downloads and transfer of other data
• If good internet security is not in place
• Your personal computer could be attacked by hackers
• Could potentially bring a whole country’s economy to a halt if business is
affected

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Security aspects when using the Internet
• Definitions
• Hacker – a person who tries to gain unauthorized access to a computer or
network
• Malware – a software program that is designed to damage or disrupt a
computer
• Virus – a software program that is designed to corrupt a computer and the
files on it
• Spyware – a software program that collects user’s information through their
internet connection
• Hacking – gaining unauthorized access to a computer or network

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Security aspects when using the Internet
• Malware – different types of malware
• Viruses: a program that is downloaded onto a computer without the user’s
knowledge or permission. It is designed to harm a computer and the files that
are on it. The most common type of virus will replicate itself over and over
again until it brings your computer system to a halt. A virus is often spread
through sharing files and attachments on emails
• Spyware: software that is created to collect information on a user’s computer
through their internet connection. The collection of the data is done without
the user’s knowledge or permission and it is collected normally to be sold on
for marketing purposes. It can also gather information such as passwords,
banking and credit card details. These details can then be used to steal the
user’s identity.

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Security aspects when using the Internet
• Malware – different types of malware
• Spyware continued: Spyware is created by people who want to obtain this data to
use it unlawfully. It is often downloaded from untrustworthy websites without the
user being aware of it. This spyware hides inside the data downloaded and infects
the computer without the user being aware of the action. It can also reduce the
bandwidth available to the user by using the bandwidth to transfer the data it has
collected
• Hacking
• Someone (black-hat hacker) who tries to gain unlawful access to a computer or
network by writing a program that will do this. They look for weaknesses in the setup
of a network or computer system and uses this as a way to enter. They do this to gain
access to money, as a challenge to themselves or to protest an issue they want
highlighted. A white-hat hacker (ethical hacker) exposes security issues but not for
unlawful reasons. Can be hired by a company to test its network and systems

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Security aspects when using the Internet –
protecting against the risks
• Anti-virus software
• Used to detect a virus attack on a computer system
• Will scan the computer’s hard disk for any virus attacks and will remove any
that it finds
• Most anti-virus software have an update function built into them – this means
that when a new virus is discovered, the anti-virus software developers can
release an update for computers to detect it
• Can also be used to detect and remove further malware and spyware
• The anti-virus software cannot prevent an attack, but they can detect when it
happens by scanning the computer’s hard disk and remove the harmful
programs

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Security aspects when using the Internet –
protecting against the risks
• Firewall
• Used to monitor transmissions coming into and going out of a computer or
network
• Can be hardware or software based
• Hardware firewalls are more difficult to compromise but are more expensive
• Software firewalls are cheap, can be easily updated but can be disabled by a
virus
• A firewall uses rules to determine whether an inbound or outbound
transmission should be allowed. Some are determined by the system e.g.,
email transmissions, others by the User, e.g., online multiplayer games
• It blocks transmissions that do not conform to the rules
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Internet principles of operation
• Internet service provider (ISP)
• The internet is a global wide area network (WAN) of interconnected
computers and devices
• To access the internet, we need an Internet Service Provider
• A company that provides users with access to the internet, normally for a fee
• Broadband uses cabling like fibre-optic cables to provide faster access to the
internet (alternative is a dial-up modem using telephone lines – cheaper but
slow)
• ISP has terms of service that a customer will need to conform to when using
the internet e.g., amount of data a User can download, using the service for
hacking
• Allows user to personalize access to the internet e.g. prevent access to any
underage websites
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Internet principles of operation
• Internet Browser
• A website consists of one or more page of information that can be accessed by other
computers on the internet – known as webpages
• A browser is a program that allows the computer user to visit, retrieve and display
the information that a webpage contains
• Content can be in the form of text, images, video and sound
• Some animation require plug-ins. Not all plug-ins work with all browsers
• To access the website the user inputs the website’s web address into the browser –
the URL, uniform resource locator
• This is translated into a unique internet address of the web server that hosts the
website
• The browser accesses the website determined by the URL and downloads the
content
• Browsers also allow users to navigate to different webpages on the website and to
other websites via the use of hyperlinks

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Internet principles of operation
• Web server
• A computer that hosts a website is called a webserver. It may host many websites.
The webserver stores each page of the website and its related content. Retrieving
information from a webserver is known as downloading. Sending information to a
website is known as uploading. A computer that accesses information from a
webserver is known as a client
• Accessing a website is known as a request. Webservers are designed to handle many
requests from many clients simultaneously
• Requested information is downloaded from a webserver in packets. Since each
packet consists of only a few bytes, many packets can be sent to many computers in
a very short space of time. This means the more bandwidth the webserver has
access to, the more requests it can handle simultaneously
• Webservers can be forced offline through what is known as DDOS attacks
(distributed denial of service attacks) – attackers flood the webserver with millions of
requests until the webserver comes to a halt trying to satisfy all the requests
simultaneously

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Internet protocols – http/https
• HTTP (Hypertext transfer protocol) is the core protocol that governs
transmission of data via the internet – it is an access protocol
• It works as a request-response action: a client makes a request via HTTP,
that the information on the website be made available to it. The webserver
responds by transmitting the website data via HTTP to the client computer
• The actual transfer of information is handled by another protocol – the
transmission control protocol (TCP). This handles the transfer of the data,
and also checks to ensure the transmission is error free
• HTTP is not secure – a more secure version is known as HTTPS (Hypertext
transfer protocol secure) – this encrypts the messages making them
extremely difficult to understand by anyone that tries to intercept them,
other than the intended recipient
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Internet protocols – mark-up language(html)
• The transmission a client computer receives from a webserver is often
in the form of a hypertext markup language (HTML) document
• A HTML document consists of 2 parts:
• The content of the document
• Instructions as to how the contents are to be interpreted (structure)

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Internet protocols – mark-up language(html)
• Markups are instructions on how content is to be formatted, structured and displayed by the browser – markups in HTML
take the form of tags
• Content that requires formatting is tagged at the start < > (opening), and at the end, </> (closing)
• Hypertext is text that conveys information and also contains a link to other information, e.g. another webpage, website,
picture, video or sound file – the hypertext contains a hyperlink that is the URL of the additional content. By clicking on the
hypertext you go directly to the linked resource

11'.;, '

o·pe.ning tag Tag~ont~

<.b> emboldens the text </b> I emboldens the text
<hl> sets the text as a heading </hl> sets the text as a heading
in a large font in a large font
< et> defines a hyperlink </a> defines a hyperlink
<p> I sets a new paragraph </p>
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sets a new paragraph
Internet protocols – Cascading Style Sheets
(CSS)
• When creating websites, it is preferable to separate content and structure
from presentation
• Many organisations refresh their look and style of their websites often to
maintain audience interest – while the content remains the same
• In this way the style can be easily changed without having to change the
content, and vice versa
• Styling markup instructions are placed in a separate document known as a
cascading style sheet (CSS)
• Once created, the style sheet can be applied to any HTML document and
the document will have its contents presented in the format stated by the
style sheet’s markup instructions

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Internet protocols – Cascading Style Sheets
(CSS)
• Has a huge benefit for website designers as all the pages of a website
can be quickly and uniformly updated simply by changing the mark-up
instructions in the style sheet
• Each HTML page provides the content and the structure, and the CSS
specifies the presentation

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Internet protocols – HTML document
• An HTML document is structured into 2 elements
• The header
• The body
• The header declares the document type (HTML), the page title, any
special instructions for the page such as plugins to be used or scripts
to run. Also includes any CSS that are to be used on the page and
where to locate them
• The body contains the content to be displayed, hyperlinks to other
pages and, if a CSS is not used, any formatting instructions for the
content
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Internet protocols – HTML document
HTML document structure:
-
Page I

(header) ' -
,
("•I
I
l

" / Page title •·

I
/ Scripts
I
. / Styles/style sheets
-
I.
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(body) . -
• ..

Content
-

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Internet addresses – IP addresses
• Networks and the internet use the transmission control protocol (TCP) for communication
• Each device on a network has an address so that other devices know how to reach it
• The device's network address is known as its internet protocol address (IP address)
• Each IP address consists of a 32-bit code – broken down into 4 groups of 3 digits. Each group in
the range 0 to 255 e.g., 192.168.001.255(denary) – in binary it would be represented in 32 bits (4
bytes)
• A newer version of IP addressing has been launched – IPv6 – uses 128 bits (16 bytes) to assign
addresses – making many more IP addresses available
• You can have static or dynamic IP addresses.
• With static addresses the address stays with the device until physically changed, even when the device is
removed and then re-attached to the network.
• Dynamic addresses are allocated for a period of time (lease period), when the lease period is up, the device is
either re-assigned the same address, or assigned another – when a device disconnects then reconnects to
the network, the previously assigned address may have been taken by another device, so a different IP
address is assigned

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Internet addresses – URL (Uniform Resource
Locator)
• We recognize the URL as a website address
• It is made up of the
• Access protocol – http or https
• Domain name – e.g., dstv.com
• This URL would be HTTP://www.dstv.com
• When visiting a website, we type the website’s URL into our browser
• The URL is translated by a special type of server, called the Domain Name
Server, into the 32-bit binary IP address
• A URL is far easier to remember than a 32-bit binary number, it also allows
an organization to personalize its web address with the organisation’s
name
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Internet addresses – MAC addresses
• Each device on the network also has another address called its media
access control address (MAC address)
• Uniquely identifies each device, assigned by the device’s
manufacturer (IP address is assigned by the network)
• The MAC address cannot be changed – a device can be identified
even if its IP address has been changed
• Consists of 6 pairs of 2-digit hexadecimal numbers (48-bit binary
code) e.g., 1a2f08a1234c

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Internet addresses – Cookies
• Tiny pieces of data that are downloaded by a computer when it visits a website
• Cookies are stored by the client’s browser and are accessed by the website
whenever it is visited by the client
• They perform various essential tasks
• Keep track of whether or not a user has logged in to secure websites
• Stores dynamic data such as the items the user has added to an online store’s shopping
basket
• Also used for activities that cause concern:
• Track user’s internet surfing activities and then tailor online adverts to match the user’s interests
• Store sensitive user information such as passwords and credit card details, which can be accessed at a
later date
• Can be declined by the user or removed from the computer if the user has
concerns, using the device’s browser

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Summary
• Data can be transmitted in different ways
• Serial (along a single wire) or
• Parallel (along multiple wires)
• Can also be transmitted in different directions
• Simplex – one-way only
• Full duplex – both directions, simultaneously
• Half duplex, both directions, but only 1 way at a time
• Errors can occur during transmission – methods of error detection and
correction exist
• Parity checks
• Check digit
• Checksums
• ARQ

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Summary
• Security risks such as malware, including viruses, spyware and hacking can arise
when using the internet. These risks can be minimized by using anti-virus
software (software) and firewalls (software or hardware)
• An ISP is a company that provides a connection to use the internet, normally for a
fee
• A browser is a program that allows a user to visit, retrieve and display the
information that a webpage contains.
• A computer that hosts a website is called a web server
• HTTPS is a more secure version of HTTP, used for banks, shopping and other sites
that need added security in transmitting personal information
• HTML is the language that webpages are written in. An HTML document consists
of 2 parts – the content to be displayed and instructions on how to interpret that
content. The instructions on how to display the content is done through the use
of tags, known as mark-ups
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Summary
• Each computer or device has a unique address called a MAC address –
assigned to the device when it is manufactured and cannot be
changed
• When using the internet, each computer or device is assigned an IP
address, which can be static or dynamic
• We use a URL to access a website. It is normally typed into the
address bar of a computer and is made up of the access protocol
(HTTP or HTTPS) and the website domain name
• Cookies are tiny pieces of data that are downloaded by a computer
when it visits a website. They are stored by the computer’s browser
and are accessed the website whenever it is visited by the client
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