Both SCDN and CDN are designed to optimize content distribution efficiency, but there are certain differences between SCDN and CDN in terms of functional architecture, security protection and applicable scenarios. Mainly reflected in technical implementation, business needs and other aspects, understanding the differences is conducive to making reasonable decisions faster and clearer.
Differences in technical architecture and core functions
The core mechanism of CDN is to use globally distributed nodes to cache static resources, such as images, CSS, videos, etc. When a user request occurs, the user's nearest edge node responds, which is conducive to reducing the return delay. The main advantage is to reduce the source load and increase the loading speed of static content, but the security protection capability is still subject to certain limitations, and can only provide basic DDoS mitigation and SSL encryption.
SCDN deeply integrates security modules on the basis of CDN and has the following enhanced features:
SCDN supports intelligent attack defense, identifies DDoS/CC attacks in real-time traffic analysis, and automatically switches malicious traffic to high-defense IP cleaning. Normal requests still come out of the acceleration node. For example, a single SCDN node may provide a DDoS cleaning capability of hundreds of G.
In terms of dynamic content acceleration, optimize the routing strategy of dynamic requests such as API calls and real-time data. Combined with TCP optimization and protocol compression, dynamic content latency is reduced by more than 30%.
3. Refined access control: Supports IP blacklist and whitelist, Referer hotlink protection, multi-factor authentication, etc. to prevent sensitive data leakage.
Compared from the performance and security indicators, SCDN acceleration range supports static or dynamic content, while CDN only supports static content. CDN can support basic DDOS defense, and SCDN can support full-link HTTPS/WAF/CC attack interception. In latency optimization, CDN relies on node coverage, while SCDN can support intelligent routing and protocol optimization. In terms of cost, SCDN is more expensive because it is 30%-50% more expensive than CDN with security surcharges. The price of CDN is cheaper, roughly 0.01-0.1 yuan/GB.
Selection decision framework
1. Business type analysis
Businesses with static content as the main content, such as blogs or corporate websites, are more recommended to choose CDN, which has higher cost-effectiveness. Highly interactive dynamic applications such as e-commerce and live broadcasting require SCDN dynamic acceleration and real-time security protection. For example, during e-commerce promotions, SCDN can handle traffic peaks or malicious order fraud.
2. Security requirements assessment
If the business faces frequent attacks (such as finance and games), SCDN's WAF and CC protection are indispensable. After a game platform was connected to SCDN, the downtime caused by DDoS was reduced by 95%. Low-risk businesses (such as enterprise display sites) can only use CDN and meet compliance requirements through basic HTTPS.
3. Cost and scalability trade-off
When the initial traffic is small, CDN is more economical to charge by volume; SCDN is suitable for businesses with stable growth, and its elastic protection can avoid additional expenses caused by sudden attacks. Global businesses need to pay attention to node coverage. SCDN usually inherits CDN nodes, but the cleaning capacity of the target area needs to be confirmed.
Implementation suggestions
Hybrid deployment uses SCDN to ensure security for core businesses, and uses CDN to reduce costs for non-critical static resources. Service providers choose to verify SLA (such as 99.9% availability), cleaning capacity (≥500Gbps) and log analysis functions. Some SCDN services are highly integrated and support API automated management.
CDN is an economical solution for content distribution, and SCDN has become the first choice for high-value businesses through its integrated design of "acceleration and security". The selection requires a comprehensive assessment of content type, attack risk, and long-term operation and maintenance costs, and dynamic adjustment of the architecture to adapt to business evolution.
