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Glossary of terms and definitions for IT (Information Technology), the Internet and cyber security.
This glossary provides more than 480 clear and concise definitions of commonly used terms in the fields of information technology, the internet, and cyber security. It is designed to support users of all levels in understanding key concepts, technical jargon, and acronyms frequently encountered across digital platforms and security-related discussions. Whether you are a business owner, student, professional, or simply interested in the digital landscape, this resource aims to enhance your knowledge and confidence in navigating the ever-evolving world of technology.
A website is a collection of related web pages accessible under a single domain, hosted on a server and available via the internet.
Example: The Australian Bureau of Statistics maintains a website with national data and reports.
See also: Web Page
A website designed and created to adapt its layout and content automatically based on the user's device screen size and orientation.
Example: The local council's responsive website works well on both desktop computers and mobile devices.
See also: Website
The Address Bar is the text field in a web browser, usually near the top, where users enter a website's URL to navigate to a specific web page.
Example: The user typed www.digitaldreams.com.au into the address bar to access the Digital Dreams website.
See also: Browser
The discovery, interpretation, and communication of meaningful data patterns, often for web traffic.
Example: The marketing team reviewed website analytics to understand visitor behaviour.
The server-side part of a website or application that handles logic, database interaction, and server configuration.
Example: The developer fixed a bug in the back end that caused login issues.
See also: Front End
A form of online advertising displayed as a rectangular graphic at the top, bottom, or side of a web page.
Example: A banner ad for travel deals appeared at the top of the news website.
A regularly updated website or section of a website featuring written content, often in a conversational style, maintained by an individual or organisation. The term 'blog' is a shortened form of 'weblog', which originated in the late 1990s to describe online journals or logs of web activity.
Example: She started a food blog to share recipes and reviews of local cafés.
A network of internet-connected devices infected with malware and controlled by a central attacker. Botnets are often used for large-scale attacks like DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service).
Example: Thousands of infected computers are used simultaneously to overwhelm a website, making it crash.
See also: DDoS, Zombie Computer
An organisation that issues digital certificates to verify identities and secure online communications.
Example: Your web browser shows a padlock icon when visiting a secure website, indicating a valid certificate from a trusted CA.
A temporary storage area in computers or browsers used to store frequently accessed data or files to speed up future access. Caching improves performance by reducing the need to re-download or reprocess information each time it is requested.
Example: Clearing the browser cache resolved the website loading issue.
A software platform that enables users to create, manage, and modify digital content on websites without needing advanced technical knowledge.
Example: The council's website was built using a CMS that allowed staff to update pages easily.
A Canonical Name (CNAME) record is a type of DNS record that maps an alias domain name to the true or canonical domain name.
Example: The CNAME record maps www.example.com to example.com so both addresses point to the same website.
See also: DNS (Domain Name System)
A small piece of data stored on the user's device by a website to remember preferences or login details.
Example: The website asked for cookie consent to track usage.
A Crawler, also known as a web spider or bot, is a program used by search engines to scan and index content from websites.
Example: Google's crawler visited the website to index new blog posts for search results.
See also: Search Engine
A type of cyber attack where attackers use large sets of stolen username and password combinations, often obtained from previous data breaches, to gain unauthorised access to multiple online accounts. This attack exploits the common practice of people reusing the same credentials across different platforms and services.
Example: After acquiring a database of stolen login credentials from a breached e-commerce website, attackers attempt to access users' social media and banking accounts using the same email and password combinations.
An attack where a malicious website tricks a user's browser into performing actions on another website where the user is authenticated.
Example: A user clicks a malicious link that causes their bank account to transfer funds without their knowledge.
A language used to describe the presentation and layout of HTML elements on web pages.
Example: The designer used CSS to change the font and colour scheme of the website.
See also: HTML
Illegal activities carried out using computers or the internet, such as hacking, fraud, or identity theft.
Example: A scammer steals credit card information through a fake shopping website.
An attack that manipulates DNS (Domain Name System) records to redirect users to fraudulent websites.
Example: You type in your bank's website address, but DNS spoofing sends you to a fake site designed to steal your login details.
A unique address used to identify a website on the internet, typically ending in .com, .org, .au, etc.
Example: They registered a new domain for their business website.
An attack where a system is overwhelmed with traffic or requests, making it unavailable to legitimate users.
Example: A hacker floods a website with so many requests that it crashes and can't be accessed.
See also: DDoS
The process of receiving digital data from the internet or a remote system onto a local device, typically for storage or offline use.
Example: She downloaded a report from the government website.
See also: Upload
The unintentional download of malware when visiting a compromised website, often without the user's knowledge.
Example: Visiting an infected website causes a malicious file to be downloaded onto your computer automatically.
A document or web page that lists and answers common queries on a specific subject to assist users.
Example: The website had an FAQ section to help new users.
A former multimedia platform for displaying animations, videos, and interactive content in browsers, now largely replaced by HTML5.
Example: The website's old games required Flash to run.
The part of a software application or website that users interact with directly. It includes the visual layout, design, and elements such as buttons, menus, and text fields, and is typically built using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
Example: The front end of the website was redesigned to improve user experience and mobile compatibility.
See also: Back End
A data protection and privacy regulation enacted by the European Union (EU) that governs how organisations collect, store, process, and share the personal data of EU citizens. Although it is an EU regulation, GDPR applies to any organisation worldwide, including Australian businesses, that handle the personal data of individuals located in the EU.
Example: An e-commerce business selling products to customers in Europe must ensure its website complies with GDPR requirements, such as obtaining explicit consent for data collection, providing clear privacy notices, and offering customers the ability to delete their personal data upon request.
The main entry page of a website or the default page shown when a web browser starts.
Example: The homepage featured the latest news updates.
A protocol used for transmitting data over the internet. It defines how messages are formatted and transmitted, and how web servers and browsers should respond to various commands. HTTP is the foundation of data communication on the World Wide Web.
Example: The website uses HTTP to load pages.
A clickable link in a digital document or webpage that directs users to another location, file, or website.
Example: Clicking the hyperlink took her to the university's admissions page.
A combination of two or more words that together represent a specific concept or search intent. Keyphrases are used in digital content and search engine optimisation (SEO) to improve visibility and relevance for complex or specific queries.
Example: She entered the keyphrase 'website design gold coast' into Google.
See also: Keyword
Localhost refers to the local computer that a user is currently working on, typically accessed using the IP address 127.0.0.1 for testing purposes.
Example: A web developer tests a website on their machine using localhost before deploying it to a live server.
Malicious advertisements that spread malware when users click on them or simply view them.
Example: An online advert on a legitimate website installs ransomware on a user's computer when clicked.
A general term for any malicious software designed to damage, disrupt, or exploit computers, networks, or data. Types include viruses, worms, ransomware, and spyware.
Example: A user downloads some free software from an unofficial website, unknowingly installing malware that tracks their keystrokes and steals their login credentials.
Multilingual refers to a website or application that supports content in multiple languages to accommodate users from different linguistic backgrounds.
Example: A tourism website in Australia is multilingual, offering pages in English, French, and Japanese.
An open-source relational database management system.
Example: The website stored user data in a MySQL database.
See also: SQL
A Page View is a metric that counts each time a web page is loaded or reloaded in a browser, used to measure website traffic and user engagement.
Example: The business website received over 5,000 page views during the first week of its new campaign.
A social engineering attack where cyber criminals send fraudulent emails or messages designed to trick recipients into revealing sensitive information or clicking malicious links.
Example: You receive an email claiming to be from your bank, asking you to click a link and enter your account details, but the link leads to a fake website.
A raster image file format that supports lossless compression and transparency, often used for web graphics and digital images requiring high quality.
Example: She saved the logo as a PNG to preserve its transparency on the website.
A small window that appears automatically on a computer screen, often used for advertisements, notifications, or additional information.
Example: The website displayed a pop-up offering a discount code.
Protective DNS (PDNS) is a security service that analyses and filters DNS queries to prevent access to malicious domains. It blocks connections to phishing sites, malware command-and-control servers, and other cyber threats before they can cause harm.
Example: An employee accidentally clicks on a phishing link in an email. However, the company's PDNS service detects that the domain is linked to known phishing activity and blocks the request, preventing the user from accessing the harmful website.
A Public IP Address is an IP address that is assigned to a device for direct access over the internet, allowing it to communicate with other internet-connected devices.
Example: An Australian web server uses a public IP address so that users around the world can access the hosted website.
See also: IP Address
The page displayed by a search engine in response to a user's query, listing relevant links.
Example: The company's website appeared at the top of the SERP after a user searched for its product.
See also: Search Engine
A computer system that provides services or resources to other devices on a network.
Example: The website is hosted on a secure server.
A temporary connection between a user and a system, website, or application that begins when the user logs in or starts interacting and ends when they log out or become inactive.
Example: The user's session expired after 10 minutes of inactivity.
A unique identifier issued to a user during a session to maintain authentication and track activity.
Example: When you log into a website, a session token keeps you logged in until you sign out.
A type of attack where malicious SQL code is inserted into a database query to manipulate or steal data.
Example: An attacker enters specially crafted input into a website's login field to bypass authentication and access the database.
SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) = A cryptographic protocol designed to establish a secure and encrypted connection between two systems over a network. SSL ensures that data transmitted between these systems remains confidential, authenticated, and protected from interception or tampering. While commonly associated with securing communication between web browsers and web servers (HTTPS), SSL can also secure email communications, file transfers, instant messaging, and other network services. Although SSL has been largely replaced by its successor, TLS (Transport Layer Security), the term "SSL" is still widely used to refer to secure communication protocols.
Example: When you see a padlock icon in your browser's address bar, it indicates the website is using SSL/TLS encryption.
See also: TLS, SSL Certificate
A digital certificate that authenticates a website's identity and enables encrypted connections.
Example: They installed an SSL certificate to secure their online store.
The total sum of all possible vulnerabilities, entry points, or attack vectors in a system that an attacker could exploit.
Example: A company identifies its threat surface as including its website, email server, customer database, employee laptops and devices, point-of-sale (POS) systems, Wi-Fi network, cloud services, cloud storage, and remote work tools.
A type of cyber attack where attackers register domain names similar to popular websites to trick users into visiting malicious sites.
Example: A fake website called "gogle.com" is set up to steal login details from users who mistype the real "google.com."
The process of sending data from a local device to a remote server or system over a network, typically the internet.
Example: She uploaded her resume to the job application website.
See also: Download
The address used to access resources on the internet, such as web pages, images, or files.
Example: The URL for our website is: https://www.digitaldreams.com.au
A modern image format developed by Google that provides superior compression for images on the web, supporting both lossy and lossless compression as well as transparency and animation.
Example: The website used WebP images to reduce page load times without sacrificing visual quality.
A web page is a single document on the internet written in HTML and viewed in a browser, forming part of a website.
Example: The web page displayed details about upcoming community events in Brisbane.
See also: Website
A device that has been compromised by malware and is controlled remotely by an attacker, often used in botnets for cyber attacks.
Example: A hacker uses thousands of zombie computers to launch a Distributed Denial-of-Service (DDoS) attack on a website.
See also: Botnet