An administrator has been asked to transfer a large file over the Internet to a customer. The transfer is needed as soon as possible. Which of the following protocols is the administrator MOST…

SCP uses SSH encryption for every byte transferred, adding cryptographic overhead that reduces throughput compared to unencrypted FTP.

SFTP is an SSH subsystem that encrypts all commands and data, introducing session negotiation and encryption latency not present in FTP.

FTPS wraps FTP in TLS/SSL, requiring certificate handshakes and per-packet encryption that slow transfer speeds relative to plain FTP.

FTP (RFC 959) uses two unencrypted channels - one for control commands and one for data - with no TLS handshake or cryptographic processing required. This absence of encryption overhead makes it the fastest file transfer option among the listed protocols when time is the critical factor, even though data is transmitted in plaintext.

HTTP is designed for web request-response cycles and lacks the dedicated dual-channel data transfer architecture that makes FTP efficient for large files.

HTTPS adds TLS overhead to HTTP, making it slower than FTP for bulk data transfer and not typically used as a direct large-file transfer mechanism.