E-Commerce - Exploration of Blogging 09'

E-Government in Malaysia: Its implementation so far and citizen’s adoption strategies.

2009-07-12T09:06:00.000-07:00

Current application of e-government in Malaysia--E-filling—

Renew road tax online

Dr Norraesah said the online service enabled the public to renew their road tax from anyplace with Internet access and at anytime, via www.myeg.com.my and www.jpj.gov.my.

For RM2.75, you can now renew your road tax online and, for an additional RM6, have the road tax delivered to you the next day in the Klang Valley.

The delivery fee for those living outside the Klang Valley is RM8, and RM10 for those in Sabah and Sarawak.

Driving license renewa l
Payment for renewal driving license

KWSP i-account
provided free of change for i-account new registration.

E-perolehan

The electronic procurement system, better known as ePerolehan, streamlines government procurement activities and improves the quality of service it provides.

ePerolehan converts traditional manual procurement processes in the Government machinery to electronic procurement on the Internet.

ePerolehan allows suppliers to present their products on the World Wide Web, receive, manage and process purchase orders and receive payment from government agencies via the Internet.

The supplier's product catalogue is converted into the form of an electronic catalogue or eCatalogue, which can be viewed from any desktop with a web browser. The supplier is able to submit quotations, obtain tender document and submit tender bid through ePerolehan.

Perolehan allows suppliers to register or renew their registration with the Ministry of Finance through the Internet. Suppliers are able to submit application, check application status and pay registration fees through ePerolehan.

Common problems encounter by consumers.
The consumers may be not familiar using e-government service instead of they will go to the government center to pay their tax rather than using e-filling or e-payment.

Suggest ways to e-government that the consumer will use e-government services.
In my opinion, guidance is the beginning step that the government needs to apply to coach and guide Malaysian citizen on how to use e-government service online and the government should provides some campaign or seminar about various types of e-government services general information.

http://www.mscmalaysia.my/topic/Governments

http://www.malaysia.gov.my/EN/Pages/default.aspx

http://home.eperolehan.gov.my/home/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=193&Itemid=477&lang=en

Review a local e-commerce site

2009-07-12T01:36:00.000-07:00

Blooming.com.my is a local e-commerce site that selling flower and other small gifts such as cards bears, gourmet baskets and etc. They provide up to 100 pieces photos of hand bouquets. I’m sure that you could find you ideal bouquets in this site.

Similar to other e-commerce site, Blooming.com.my provide member registration and log in, shopping cart, search engine and so on. However, they provide some services that only members are able to read through, such as order tracking, gift reminder, address book and online payment.

I get attracted to this website because I have found out that this Blooming.com.my not only provides delivery services to Selangor (where their physical store is located), but to all major towns area). Furthermore, they do accept online credit card payments, online banking and mobile payment. Besides that, the speed of clicking around the product in the website is considered quite smoothly and faster.

For consumer purpose, Blooming.com.my has provided order tracking service where you can trade your order on the delivery status. In addition, live support is also provided so that customer could make enquiries on the spot, no need to waste money to make a call. There is a “Tips corner” that teaching customer on selecting and arrangement of flowers.

In conclusion, although all the features in Blooming.com.my are simple (not much special), but it is enough for a basic internet user to deal with e-commerce. Basic internet user would not need too much or complicated steps in ordering and searching in the website. Nevertheless, in my opinion, Blooming.com.my has to improve in their hand bouquets and also others product’s picture. Indeed, they are providing good services but the photos are not really attracting people. After changing this, I think would be more visitors and customer to view though Blooming.com.my.

A discussion on E-learning offered in Malaysian universities: Pros and Cons from students perspective

2009-07-12T01:16:00.000-07:00

In twenty-first century, the traditional teaching method by most of the universities worldwide has evolved into a more advanced and technological method through the introduction of e-learning. It is the modem process of education where part of the learning experience takes place without face to face communication between the teacher and his students. It is also known as distance learning. The most common method of e-learning is where tutors or lecturers post up several course modules on the university intranet (for example, wble of UTAR), and students will have to access to that intranet to get the materials that they needed as well as bulletin boards in order to keep them up to date. However, there are some pros and cons in adopting these technologies. In Malaysia, e-learning was begun in the late 1980's and MARA University of Technology (UTM) is one of the universities that offering distance learning during 1990.

Without much questions, e-learning is the innovative and advanced way of learning, however, it is significant to discuss both its pros and cons as well.

Pros
E-learning provides accessibility to all students irrespective of their residence. It can help students to communicate with their tutors, get clarifications regarding their subjects and study and access teaching materials through the e-libraries. Besides that, it also provides wider learning options for students, where it is not restricted to the geographic location. In other words, it means that a student studying in Malaysia can still access to the resources uploaded by foreign University. This makes the life of a student easier in his process of study and learns more about foreign knowledge. This also builds a link between local and foreign students from all over the world. Furthermore, more information or opinions can be exchanged among them.

Another advantage of e-learning is its time flexibility. Students can get online resources, communicate with his tutor or class mates, send his query and write term paper at any time he can get access to the Internet. Students' interactions have become much easier than face-to-face communication.

Moreover, online students have the capability to study at their own pace. In a traditional setting, students need to finish their given assignments within a particular period of time, while through online education they can study whenever they are free. The online faculty assigns projects with a deadline and students can finish their projects at whatever time that they find feasible before the deadline.

Therefore, e-learning enable students to reduce travelling cost and time because of the accessibility, time flexibility of e-learning as well as the capability of the student to study at their own pace with e-learning.

Cons
One of the cons of using e-learning is that it might be costly. In order to use e-learning, certain installation costs are needed, such as high-speed internet costs and software applications. Therefore, it requires some costs to implement e-learning.

Besides that, unmotivated learners or students with poor study habits might find it difficult to follow e-learning as they are not familiar with the structure and routine of the process. They may require much more time to understand it.

E-learning sometimes might not be working successfully due to the slow or unreliable internet connections. This may cause inability to access to the resources or inability to upload the resources in time.

Furthermore, lack of face-to-face communication with lecturers contributes lack of understanding between a student and a lecturer. While a lecturer cannot easily feel a student's demands, interests and motivations, a student can simply be lazy being non-motivated enough and having free time schedule for his e-learning. This may result a low scope of the student's knowledge and the lecturer's accusation in lack of proficiency.

Corporate Blogging : A new marketing communication tool for companies

2009-07-11T12:47:00.000-07:00

A corporate weblog is published and used by an organization in order to reach its organizational goals and nowadays it is widely used worldwide. The example of the corporate blog included internal, external and CEO Blogs. Currently, most of the browsers like Firefox, Opera, Safari and Internet Explorer 7 enable readers to read the recent posts easily without truly visit the blog through supporter of RSS technology.
According to research of NewPR Wiki, there was 58 (11.6%) of the Fortune 500 were blogging as of 17/5/2008. One of the successful blogs is Amazon Web Services Blog by Amazon.com that contains Amazon web services, products, tools and developer information. It helps to improve the communication and its customer services, attract more people to consume and discuss new products online.

Corporate blogging’s functions included providing a clear mind map or editorial guidelines of overall marketing or communication strategy to its employees and third parties with organization communication plan and media mix. Besides that, it encourages employee participation in contribution of expertise, free discussion of issues or topics and deal with it, collective intelligence, be a direct communication between various layers of an organization and shares their views with others employees, teams or spokespersons publicly. Furthermore, it can be used to announce new products and services, explain and clarify policies of the company and to react on public criticism on certain issues. Business blog can interact with a target market on a personal level by building a level of credibility and asking for their feedback on products and services.

Advantages ….

The advantage of blogs is that posts and comments are easy to reach and follow due to centralized hosting and generally structured conversation threads. Company blogs executed well build credibility and project a message of self-confidence. Examples of reasons to start a corporate blog would include; Employment Branding, Product Launch, Public Relations, Marketing Campaigns, Consulting Services, Vendor Relations, Media Relations, and Innovative Ideas used to established Industry Expertise.

Corporate blogging has become the new marketing communication tool for companies because it is a way of promoting about anything whether it may be public relations, marketing a new product, improving brand image and for research. Moreover, blog achieves the goal of growing a business because the company expands as it caters to online customers who may come across it. Blogs are a great tool of promoting a business; it can help in interacting with users and display their feedback. When other people view the testimonials made by customers themselves, they will be satisfied as they know that the company is listened to their comments.

Furthermore, corporate blog also is a form of advertising for companies because customer will seek there again and again. Indirectly, there has become an advertisement to the customers. There is a variety of information available in the blog. Therefore, a successful marketing through blogs creates or enters an area of interest where the readers are known the products or services. Finally, the corporate blogging as a success communication tool because company may do public speaking, to build trustworthiness for themselves and boost up their company’s credentials. Blogging has become a new less time consuming and less expensive way to reach potential and current customers.

Disadvantages …

Corporate blogging might easily involved in defamation and invasion of privacy or to breach information security and loss of company confidentiality. (Wired News, 2005) Hence, this fear has stopped 22 percent of employees from writing a corporate blog. Besides that, it will create an expectation of updating the blog regularly and the time that taken in writing a blog will cause loss of $ 759 billion in productivity every year. Additionally, a new style of communication will be mastered since corporate blogging become popular in these recent years. In conclusion, corporate blogging is getting important for corporation to deliver the message privately or publicly since it has brought many pros even thought the cons come along with it.

A review on a post on Legal from My E-Commerce blog

2009-07-11T05:51:00.000-07:00

Malaysian government announced that there will be some new guidelines to be enforced soon on Internet and cyber cafes.

Cyber cafe normally attracts kids and children to play games. Thus, there are guidelines to be enforced to protect new the youth is to restrict minors under the age of 18 entering internet cafes. Such as those under 12 years old must be accompanied by parents or guardian and only allowed to stay up to 10.00pm. However, only the government regulation is not enough to prohibit all youth enter into cyber cafe those under 12 yrs old. The parent is play the important role to prohibit the youth enter the cyber café.

Another guideline is enforced to protect to the youth from the influence of internet cafes. However, only the government check is not enough to block all prohibited sites from users. Compulsory installation of protective software can be one of the considerations to strengthen the initiatives.

The government announced the internet and cyber cafe is prohibited from providing gaming activities, gambling, pornography, music and publications with negative element, besides that the cigarettes and alcohol to be prohibited from being sold in the cyber cafe. This guideline is enforced to prevent the Internet and cyber cafes from turning into the social ills, and can reduce the social ills.

Illegal internet cafes should be punished such as legal internet cafes that fail to meet important guideline will have their licenses revoked. The legal duties are only claimed on operators or customers. It would be more effective if the responsibilities are imposed on staff. The business of internet and cyber cafe still can survive if provide some promotion and explain to customer in respect of these guidelines.

Application of prepaid cash card

2009-07-05T04:28:00.000-07:00

What are the Prepaid Cash Cards ???
Prepaid cash cards are the cards, which mostly made up from plastics that can be used to make payment for goods and services and even to withdraw money. However, before using it, the user needs to load the card with a sum of money. Therefore, a prepaid cash card allows the consumers to purchase something even when they don’t have the cash to pay for it. It has benefited the consumers in their everyday life.

Prepaid Cash Cards – the advantages …
Nowadays so many people tend or already have their own prepaid cash cards, why is it so? The advantages are vary as below :

1. Remain in control of one’s money, keep track all of activity online or by phone – People can limit their spending and plan how much they want to spend in advance with their prepaid cash card. Thus, spending is controlled by how much one has in the account. Besides that, prepaid cash cards give consumers a better alternative in keeping record of your spending.

2. Prepaid cash cards are always convenient all the time. It can be used at just anywhere anytime. Consumers can use it at their groceries shopping, petrol filling, utilities payment, movie tickets, airline tickets, download songs online, mobile phone bill, fast food or restaurant and even online shopping or any online payment! Or, they can even use it to withdraw cash from the ATM. Besides that, having a prepaid cash card is certainly quick and easy. Transaction can be made just within a minute. All you have to do is hand swap your card on the counter, sign on the receipt and collect your card and a copy of the receipt.
3. Eliminate check cashing fees and enjoy immediate access to your money through direct deposit of your pay check, government payment or other income sources, no bank account needed.

4. Avoid bounced check fees; always know exactly how much money you have to spend. The prepaid card can help protect you from over spending.
5. Having a prepaid cash card is surely safer than carrying cash. Prepaid cash card protect consumers from unauthorized transactions even when the card is stolen or lost. Plus, these cards can also be replaced once it is stolen or lost. Unlike cash, once it’s lost, it’s gone forever.
6. Free balance alerts –Some card providers will inform users on how much cash they have.

Examples of Prepaid Cash Card all around the world
Obopay
It is one of the prepaid cash cards that are similar as debit cards because both are using existing money rather than borrowing. However, personal identification number has to be keyed in for the transaction to be authorized if using prepaid cash cards. It is considered as most secure and safe financial transaction card because can it likes a portable access point to checking account. Nevertheless, it could not use for online shopping and in “quick pay” terminals that have a card reader but no keypad to enter a personal identification number.

Pre-paid Vista Cash Card is issued by Four Oaks Bank & Trust Company that given the opportunity for consumers with poor credit record and young children by not spending more than the balance on the card. Visa permits travelers access to money at automated teller machines in 65 countries and book the train tickets by offering prepaid cash card such as Metro Card in New York City.

Touch ‘n Go (TnG) smart card is used by Malaysian for electronic payment system to toll expressway and highway. It is expanding its business to retail purchase by starting with fast food industry that enables consumers to buy dough nut, burger or fast-food from 21 outlets such as Burger King, 7-Eleven, Dunkin’ Donut. It is imitating the success of Hong Kong’s Octopus Card by setting 5 to 10% of the card holders for retail purchase as current target of the company.

Octopus Card was launched in Hong Kong on year 1997, September. It is a rechargeable contactless stored value smart card to transfer electronic payments in online in offline system. It is widely used in payment system for transportation, supermarkets, fast food restaurant, car parks and other pint of sale application such as service station s and vending machines that have achieved good outcomes.

In a nutshell, prepaid cash card is indeed a good invention that makes life easier, it contributed a lot in eliminating debt risk with no chance to spend too much as the balance is limited to the amount reloaded, and the convenience that it provide is indeed great.

A review on a post on e-tailing from My E-Commerce blog

2009-07-03T22:48:00.000-07:00

Touch n Go card is well known as a pre-load cash card which is mainly use for transportation and toll collection purpose. Recently, Touch n Go Sdn Bhd (TNGSB) has been introduced in both KL International Airport (KLIA) and Low-Cost Carrier Terminal (LCCT) since February 2008.

Touch n Go card, famous for its usage as a pre-load cash card used mainly for transportation and toll collection, is now expanding their applications and services towards the retail purchase, starting with particularly the fast-food industry.
One of the application offered is enable the user to buy burger, doughnut or fast food from 21 outlets involved in a pilot scheme for Touch n Go card. Among the participating outlets are A&W, Burger King, Dunkin' Donut, 7-eleven, Carrefour hypermarkets, Caltex convenience stores and Cineleisure. The company is targeting 5-10% of the carholders to use the card for retail purchase, emulating the success of the Hong Kong's Octopus card (20% usage for retail purchase.)

In my opinion, TNG card has been move forward to fast food industry. However, this facility only available in Klang Valley, which means most of people, especially those not around Klang Valley, has no chance to really participate in the usage. This will lead to lower usage in current and also future. I suggest that they should try to speed up in expanding this facility as what they have planned. So this will give benefits to everyone including TNGSB by increasing the usage of TNB card in retail purchase.

Electronic currency

2009-07-03T09:51:00.000-07:00

Electronic currency (also known as electronic money, digital money, digital money, digital or digital currency) refers to money or scrip which is exchanged only electrometrically. Typically, this involves use of computer networks, the internet and digital stored value systems. Example of electronic currency such as Electronic Funds Transfer ( EFT) and direct deposit also. It is a collective term for financial cryptography and technologies enabling it.

Digital money is a system of debits and credit, used to exchange value, within another system. Also sometimes the term electronic money is used to refer to the provider itself. A private currency may use gold to provide extra security, such as digital gold currency like e-gold and c-gold. Many systems will sell their electronic currency directly to the end user, such as Paypal and Wedmoney.

Advantages

Banks offer many services to the customer that transfer funds, contribute to their retirement plans and offer a variety of other services without having to handle physical cash or checks. Customers do not have to wait in lines and this provides a lower-hassle environment.

Debit cards and online bill payments allow immediate transfer of funds from an individual’s personal account to a business’s account without any actual paper transfer of money. This offers a great convenience to many people and businesses alike.

Disadvantages

Although many benefit to electronic currency, there are also many disadvantages. Three include fraud, failure of technology, possible tracking of individuals and loss of human interaction.

Fraud over digital cash has been a pressing issue in recent years. Hacking into bank account and illegal retrieval of banking records has led to a widespread invasion of privacy and has promoted identity theft.

Future evolution

Furthering network evolution in terms of digital cash development, a company names Digi-Cash is at the focus of creating an e-cash system that would allow issuers to sell electronic coins at some value. When they are purchased they come under someone’s own name and are stored on his computer or under his online identity. At all times, the e-cash is linked to the e-cash company and all transactions go through it, so the e-cash company secures anything that is purchased. Only the company knows your information and will properly direct purchases to your location.

Mobile payment systems in Malaysia: Its potentials and consumers’ adoption strategies.

2009-07-03T09:49:00.000-07:00

Mobile payment is also referred to as mobile wed payment or WAP billing and it is the collection of money from a consumer via a mobile device.

One of the mobile payment in Malaysia, Mobile Money, is guided by Mobile Money International Sdn Bhd. Mobile Money provides any handphone users the convenience to pay anyone, on any time, at anywhere. This system is a PIN-based Mobile Payment solution. It unlocks the power of the mobile phone to make payment, allowing registered users to pay for goods and services at anytime, anywhere using only a mobile phone coupled with a 6-digit security PIN (Personal Identification Number) via SMS (Short Messaging Service). This gives the freedom to shoppers to buy product online and pay the merchant using his/her mobile phone without being physically present at the store.

There is a great potential for mobile payment services in Malaysia since it is changing the behavior of users and increasing the demand over time. Supportive actions and collaborations with banks and handset vendor will helps in speed up this demand. Beside, mobile money might replace cash or face to face transaction since it is so convenience and safe to deal with. Furthermore, people now a day become more and busier, mobile payment will helps them to save time and sometime also the transportation fee.

A consumer adoption is necessary for the success of mobile payment, yet consumer may be not familiar with this payment technology. Mobile money has adopting three strategies to increase consumer adoption in this system:

i) Secure Mobile money provides highest security to protect their user while doing payment.
ii) They conform to best practices in industry, participating bank and regulated relevant authorities.
iii) Rewarding Mobile Money rewarded user while shopping or purchasing using Mobile Money System

http://www.mobile-money.com
http://www.neowave.com.my/mobilemoney_overview.asp

Credit Card debts: Causes and Prevention

2009-07-01T09:36:00.005-07:00

The more people charge to their credit cards, the greater the profits made by the credit card companies. The credit card company receives a percentage of each transaction as a merchant fee. But the big money comes from the credit card users: the more you spend using your credit cards the higher the probability you will borrow money from the credit card company at steep interest rates, get hit with fees for exceeding your credit limit, and incur larger penalties for late payments.

The psychology of credit cards themselves makes it easy for you to spend more money than you should. If you're going to use credit cards wisely and profitably, this is crucial to understand.

When you charge something to a plastic credit card, it doesn't feel as though you're really spending money. Why not? Because when you spend cash, you tend to withdaw an amount from your checking account to cover multiple purchases over a certain time period - say a few days or a week. When you spend that cash, you're aware that you are using up that informal budget. If you use the cash faster than you had planned, you're immediately aware that you might be overspending.

Reasons why consumer overspend

Poor financial management-(spends first, manage later)

Consumer is facing lack of knowledge and understanding about the nature and forms of money, how it is used and the consequences of consumer decisions in manage their major portion of income will spend on important stuff such as basic needs e.g. food, shelter and clothes rather than unimportant stuff such as desire wants e.g. luxury car, cigarettes and alcoholic beverages.

Lack of patience-(want own it now)

Some people want instant gratification. They see something and they want it immediately, regardless of whether they have the money to afford it. They lack the patience to wait even a short amount of time, and therefore they spend even when they don't have the money available to cover the purchase.

Sense of power-(buy anything)

Spending money actually makes many people feel more powerful. Whether it is handing over a wad of cash or pulling out a gold card to charge money, the simple act of spending a large amount of money gives them a rush of false power.

How to control Credit Card debt

Understand how to keep personal financial records.

For example, know that records of income, expenses are necessary for income tax purposes; understand the consequences of poor financial management.

Evaluate the relationship between spending and using credit responsibly.

For example, recognize impulse buying behavior might limit future choices; factors such as debt levels and essential expenses should be considered when deciding a reasonable credit limit.

Make sophisticated choices when comparative shopping.

For example, develop personal spending criteria based on income and needs, access information from a variety of sources (including the internet), about goods and services and apply criteria.

Teens Must Be Taught How Money and Credit Cards Works

The Crisis of Credit Visualized in Forbes.com

http://video.forbes.com/fvn/credit09/the-crisis-of-credit-visualized

Credit.com's help you take charge of your finances and eliminate debt fast.

http://www.credit.com/products/debt/

Top 10 Reasons People Over Spend

http://www.thriftyfun.com/tf000599.tip.html

Understand Consumer Credit

http://www.pay-off-debt-guide.com/consumer-credit.html

How to safeguard our personal and financial data?

2009-06-29T08:04:00.000-07:00

Internet is a global system of interconnected computer network consists of millions of private and public networks of local to global scope. Nowadays, most of us will rely on computer to store our personal data and use online financial service to perform financial transactions such as online banking, transfer money. We should have adequate safeguard to protect the confidential data from being stolen.

Password protect

Choose your password wisely. While you want to choose something you’ll remember, you don’t want it to be something that a clever thief could figure out just by learning your birth date or your child’s name. A combination of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers, and symbols will offer you more security. And remember do not reveal any personal information or passwords to anyone.

Guard your Social Security number

Make sure that anyone asking your Social Security number really needs it. Often businesses that ask for a Social Security number can use an alternative customer identification number if you ask. Make sure not to print your Social Security number on checks or in other highly visible places. Store your card in a safe place and avoid giving the number to others

Keep credit cards to a minimum

Use a credit card with a small limit for online purchase. It’s all too easy for a dishonest sales clerk to use your credit card information. If the card you use for these
Purchases has a low credit limit, at least felon won’t be able to rack up many bills before hitting a wall.

Avoid using public computer for accessing financial information

Avoid logging on to check your bank balance using a public computer or coffee shop that offers wireless access. After using any of the Financial Data Center or member services, it is a must to log out before leaving the Financial Data Center. If you are using public computer must remember to close the browser window. That is to prevent other users from reading your personal information and mail.

Install antispyware and antivirus software

Protect your computer’s security by using anti-virus software, spyware, firewalls to guard your computer information from the nefarious.

Phishing: Example and its prevention methods.

2009-06-29T01:04:00.001-07:00

What is phishing?

Phishing is a fraudulent attempt usually made through email to steal your personal information. The best way to protect your self from phishing is to learn how to recognize a phish. Phishing emails usually appear to come from a well-known organization and ask for your personal information such as credit card number, account number or password.

Examples of phishing

Internet criminals to successfully "phish" your personal information, they must get you to go from an email to a website. Phishing emails will almost always tell you to click a link that takes you to a site where your personal information is requested. Legitimate organizations would never request this information of you via email.
Examples: Phishing email / Phishing website

What to look for in a phishing email
1. Generic greeting.
Phishing emails are usually sent in large batches. To save
time, Internet criminals use generic names like "First Generic Bank
Customer" so they don't have to type all recipients' names out and send
emails one-by-one. If you don't see your name, be suspicious.
2. Forged link.
Even if a link has a name you recognize somewhere in it, it
doesn't mean it links to the real organization. Roll your mouse over the
link and see if it matches what appears in the email. If there is a
discrepency, don't click on the link. Also, websites where it is safe to
enter personal information begin with "https" — the "s" stands for secure.
If you don't see "https" do not proceed.
3. Requests personal information.
The point of sending phishing email is to trick you into providing your
personal information. If you receive an email requesting your personal
information, it is probably a phishing attempt.
4. Sense of urgency.
Internet criminals want you to provide your personal
information now. They do this by making you think something has happened
that requires you to act fast. The faster they get your information, the
faster they can move on to another victim.

The threat of online security: How safe is our data?

2009-06-29T00:19:00.000-07:00

The internet is one of the wonders of the world. But it has a dark side, just like a beautiful city that has bad neighborhoods. Online security threats are one of the biggest challenges on the Internet today. Online Security Threats come from the fact that Windows basically records everything you do; most importantly it records the web sites you visit, whether intentionally or not, and keeps copies of all the images and pictures you have viewed, including those on web pages. It is no longer unusual for others to investigate exactly what you have being doing on your computers. Therefore, we need to know what threats are out there before we can be wary of it.

Threat to your privacy

The internet makes it easy for online criminals to attack your privacy:

Accidental Actions
Accidental actions contribute to a large number of computer security risks. This category encompasses problems arising from basic lack of knowledge about online security concepts and includes issues such as poor password choices, accidental or erroneous business transactions, accidental disclosure, and erroneous or outdated software.

Hacking

Hacking is the act of illegally gaining access to your computer/sites for the sole purpose of destroying, disrupting or carrying out illegal activities on your system. A "hacker" is the person who illegally gains access. Hackers generally look for personal information, such as passwords or credit cards numbers. They may also be trying to use your Internet connection to transit their own material—or they may just be searching at random to see what they can find. However, there are many technologies out there you can use to prevent and detect hacking. A firewall, a program designed to prevent unauthorized Internet users from accessing your system, is the best way to protect your computer from intrusions

Wi-Fi eavesdropping

If you use a wireless, or Wi-Fi, network you’ll know that it lets you connect to your broadband internet connection using a radio link with a range of several hundred feet. However, this flexibility has a downside. A more sinister risk is that people can, with the right equipment, spy on you and gain access to your computer over the wireless link.

Spyware

Spyware doesn’t try to replicate itself like a virus. Instead, it relies on people downloading it mistakenly, often alongside other programs such as peer-to-peer music sharing programs. It causes a range of problems, including:
Annoying pop-up adverts.
1) Taking over your web browser.
2) Scanning your computer for private information like credit card numbers.
3) Slowing down your computer and internet connection.
4) Downloading viruses.
5) Being very difficult to remove.

Threats to your wealth

Fraud
Fraud is a growing problem online. Conmen are the dot.com entrepreneurs of crime. Common tricks include:

Phishing

Phishing is an e-mail fraud method in which the perpetrator sends out legitimate-looking email in an attempt to gather personal and financial information from recipients. Typically, the messages appear to come from well known and trustworthy Web sites. Web sites that are frequently spoofed by phishers include PayPal, eBay, MSN, Yahoo, BestBuy, and America Online. If you suspect phishing, do not reply to the e-mail or respond by clicking on a link within the e-mail message.

Identity theft

Online identity theft comes in many forms and involves the use – by someone else – of your computer and/or the information on it. Some identity thieves use an array of techniques known as social engineering to try to manipulate you into performing certain actions or divulging confidential information. Or, they may access sensitive information without you even being aware of their presence. With this information they can, for example:

1) Empty your bank account.
2) Max out your credit cards buying stuff for themselves.
3) Buy cars on tick, in your name.
4) Impersonate you online, for example using your identity in online auctions or e-commerce site.

Malicious Attacks
Attacks that specifically aim to do harm are known as premeditated or malicious attacks. They can be further broken down into attacks caused by malicious code and those caused by intentional misrepresentation. Misrepresentation is most often seen with regard to on line fraud and identity theft. Notable examples of which include computer viruses and Denial of Service (DOS) attacks.

Computer virus
Viruses are small, malicious computer programs that try to infect computers, spreading from one machine to the next. There are four main classes of viruses:

File infectors- imbed themselves into ordinary executable files and attach to other system executables when the file is run.

System or boot-record infectors- infect the first sector on a driver from which the operating system is booted-up.

Macro viruses- infect data files that include scripting "macros.”

Multi-part viruses- viruses that use more than one attack method.

Look for these clues to determine if your computer is infected with malware:
1) A sudden increase in pop-up ads
2) A browser that takes you to sites other than those you type into the
address box (also called hijacked browser)
3) Sudden or repeated changes in your computer’s home page
4) New toolbars or icons
5) Keys that suddenly don’t work
6) Sluggish or slow performance when opening programs or saving files

Denial of Service Attacks

It is another form of malicious code, are carefully crafted and executed. It is an attack on website in which an attacker uses specialize software to send a flood of data packets to the target computer with the aim of overloading its resources. it may cause a network to shut down masking it impossible for user to access the sites. Denial of Service Attacks is not new, yet they are growing in sophistication. Traditional DOS attacks usually involve one computer attacking another, but the use of multiple computers in a highly organized attack is known as Distributed Denial of Service Attacks (DDOS) becoming increasingly common. The DDOS attacker strategically builds an army of key players including:

1) One client machine for coordinating the attack
2) Three to four host machines, which are battlefields under the attacker's
direct control
3) Potentially hundreds of broadcasters, which are the legions that run the
code to generate the flood of packets that attack a target system

Certificate Authorities (CAs)

2009-06-27T01:53:00.000-07:00

Certificate Authorities (CAs) are the third parties that issue digital certificate to provide verification that your website does indeed represent your company. One of the certificate authorities is MSC Trustgate.com Sdn Bhd. It is a licensed CA in Malaysia which incorporated in 1999, under the Digital Signature Act 1997 (DSA). It offers complete security solutions for individuals, organizations, government, and e-commerce service providers by digital certificates, encryption and decryption.
The objective of MSC Trustgate is to secure the open network communications from both locally and across the ASEAN region. Trustgate provide digital certification services such as digital certificates, cryptographic products and software development. The products and services of Trustgate are SSL Certificate, Managed PKI, Personal ID, MyTRUST, MyKAD ID, SSL VPN, Managed Security Services, VeriSign Certified Training and Application Development. The vision of Trustgate is to enable organizations to conduct their business securely over the internet, as much as what they have been enjoying in the physical world.

VeriSign is the leading Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificate Authority which also enabling the security of e-commerce, communications, and interactions for Web sites, intranets, and extranets. It provides security solutions to protect an organization’s consumers, brand, Web site, and network.

Why is the 3rd party certification needed? The reason is there are threats of internet security spreading over the net nowadays. For example, with the increase of phishing on the internet; customers want to make sure that whether they are dealing business with a trusted party. They are afraid of their personal information such as ID number, passwords, credit card numbers and so on, will be sent to those companies which do not exist in this real world. Thus, the certification from 3rd party is needed to ensure their information travelled over the Internet reaches the intended recipients and is safe.

Besides that, those parties are needed because they can provide e-mail protection and validation, secure online shopping carts and more services in order to avoid being spammed, hacked and attacked by the malicious software such as virus, Trojan horse and worms.

By using the digital certificate, there are more safeguard for online shopping , where the users can be able to make transaction on the internet without fear of having the personal data being stolen, information contaminated by third parties, and the transacting party denying any commercial commitment with the users. In addition, the confidentiality of customers towards the internet can also be enhanced; therefore, the digital certificates can assist the development of greater internet based activities.

My review on a post on the Internet Security from My E-Commerce blog

2009-06-24T10:43:00.000-07:00

Symantec security firm said,
the number of viruses, worms and trojans in circulation
has topped the one million mark.

In my opinion, the computer viruses will keep on increasing due to nowadays the technology evolution is fast and furious because the upgrading of Information Technology into globalization throughout whole world intend to make the business operates everyday and more people achieve information conveniently through the Internet at anywhere and anytime get connected with the world of sharing information, application, and document with each other online user. Therefore it is easily for the malware attacks to the internet to harm the online user download and using certain unknown application for business transaction purpose and many online users will favor in using suspicious software through peer-to-peer networking (P2P) is a method of delivering computer network services in which the participants share a portion of their own resources, such as processing power, disk storage, network bandwidth, printing facilities, movies and songs.

In My-Ecommerce blog post mentioned “Throughout 2007 Symantec detected more than 711,912 novel threats which bring the total number of malicious programs that the security firm's anti-virus programs detect to 1,122,311."

Unfortunately, in 28 April 2009, Symantec Corporation announced the publication of its April 2009 MessageLabs Intelligence Report. The analysis highlights that spam has increased almost ten percent in one month, reaching heights of 85.3 percent, levels not experienced since September 2007. Also in April, the high profile G20 summit was the subject for a rise in targeted malware attacks. In addition, the number of malicious websites intercepted per day continued to increase significantly, taking the average number of intercepted each day to 3,561.

The vast majority of these viruses are aimed at PCs running,

Typically, groups engaged in hi-tech crime employ groups of programmers to generate the novel variants. The fact that these programmers expect to be paid drives the criminals to make as much money as possible out of the information they steal and to be constantly on the look out & threaten online users as new victims.

Thus, in order to avoid the increase of those numbers of viruses in future, as my suggestion the security firms should create an ultimate protection for windows such as strong antivirus system before too late to secure it.

Malicious programs hit new high

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7232752.stm

Symantec Announces April 2009 MessageLabs Intelligence Report

http://www.messagelabs.com/resources/press/28950

More Than 1 million computer viruses in circulation now

http://ecommerze.blogspot.com/2008/04/more-than-1-million-computer-viruses-in.html

Revenue model for Google, Amazon.com and eBay

2009-06-19T11:10:00.000-07:00

Google’s Revenue Model aims at increasing the visibility and traffic of its small business partners, streamlining their marketing costs, qualifying their leads and helping track returns on investment. Google mainly generates revenue by charging advertising fees and affiliate fees. Google’s revenue stream revolves around its Pay Per Click Program (PPC), AdWords and AdSense. Google owns a stunning array of popular search services that buffers it against lost market share in the flagship search engine. It is continually innovating and improving its revenue programs.

AdWords is Google’s main source of revenue which is a pay-per-click (PPC) advertising program, and site-targeted advertising for both text and banner ads. It allow the advertisers to present advertisements to people at the instant the people are looking for information related to what the advertiser has to offer. AdWords ads appear on the right side (and sometimes at the top) of Google search pages. Advertisers pay for their ad only when a Google user clicks on it. Google earns most of its revenue by allowing other website owners to advertise on their search result pages or by placing these same text ads on other sites based on relevance. The goal of an AdSense page is to get visitors to scoot off the page by clicking an ad. When a visitor clicks one, the AdSense publisher shares the cost-per-click ad revenue with Google. Google.com is using the Pay-Per-Click model. It is an online advertising payment model in which payment is based on qualifying click-through.

Amazon.com is one of the world's largest e-Commerce retailers, or retailers for short, of consumer goods. With sales several times that of its competitors, the company has achieved its status as the industry leader by adopting the concept of selling goods via the Internet's World Wide Web. The company presently enjoys significant brand, scale and capital advantages over its rivals. Amazon has many products such as books, music, video & DVDs, auctions, toys & games, consumer electronics, e-Cards, and zShop. Amazon will be able to consistently offer lower prices in relation to the traditional retailers. Amazon generates revenue model by sales, transaction fees and affiliate fees. Amazon.com will charge transaction fees on the sales and also affiliate fees on those who advertise in the Amazon website.

eBay is an online auction and shopping wedsite in which people and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide. The vast majority of eBay’s revenue is for the listing and commission on completed sale. Thus, eBay generates revenue model by sales and transaction fees. For PayPal purchases an additional commission fee is charged. Margin on each transaction is phenomenal since once the infrastructure is built, incremental cost on each transaction are tiny – all eBay is doing is transmitting bits and bytes between buyers and sellers. Advertising and other non-transaction net revenues represent a relatively small proportion of total net revenues. As a conclusion, most of the revenues for eBay and Amazon.com are from sales and transaction fees. On the other hand, Google is earning from advertising the most. However, Amazon.com and Google also charges affiliate fees on those advertisers.

Google is changing everything

2009-06-19T08:57:00.000-07:00

Nowadays, Google is known primarily for its search engine and its related targeted-advertising tools. Google’s goal is to deliver technologies to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible ad useful. Google is trying to reinvent the spreadsheet as a Web-based application that makes it simple for users to input and share data. In my opinion, the spreadsheet is very useful, because a spreadsheet is, in its most basic form, a large calculator. Its purpose is to perform both simple & complex mathematical calculations. Spreadsheets are extremely powerful and are used for 'number crunching' - (calculations on lots of figures) and also allow mathematical formulae to be applied. A good example of spreadsheet use would be to calculate sales profits for the current year which need to be presented in a graph. The range of formulae that can be applied is vast and ranging from the most basic (adding two numbers together) to complex calculations such as applying 'what if' scenarios. The spreadsheet should not be confused with a database (although it has limited database functionality) and should not be used to store mailing lists or other data records - this is a common mistake (see above the reference to somebody using a spreadsheet to create a resume). The sheet itself is comprised of columns (vertical) and rows (horizontal) which are in turn, made up of cells. It can be used for keeping small business accounting records if the company does not generate enough revenue to warrant the cost of accounting software. In short: the main advantage of a spreadsheet is when complex mathematical calculations need to be carried out on large amounts of numerical data. It's a powerful, complex calculator.

Google has an enterprise search to identify and enables specific content across the enterprise to be indexed, searched, and displayed to authorized users. Enterprise search can be integrated with other applications to improve performance. Google enterprise products make their users more productive by combining the innovation and ease of use of Google's consumer products with the features, security and support that your organization requires. They offer solutions to meet the needs of organizations of all sizes and have over 25,000 search and 1,000,000 Google Apps customers. The Google Search Appliance (GSA) provides fast, relevant search for your website or intranet. An on-premise, easy-to-deploy solution, the GSA provides your organization with high relevancy right out of the box, can be customized to meet your specific needs, and scales easily as your content grows.

History of E- Commerce

2009-06-19T04:28:00.000-07:00

There were several key incidents in the history of e-commerce. The first one was came from the development of the Electronic Data Interchange (EDI). EDI is a set of standards developed in the 1960’s in order to exchange business information and do electronic transactions. At first there was several different EDI formats that business could use, so companies still might not be able to interact with each other. However, in 1984 the ASC X12 standard became stable and reliable in transferring large amounts of transactions.

The next major incident occurred in 1992 when the Mosaic web-browser was available, it was the first ‘point and click’ browser. The Mosaic browser was quickly adapted into a downloadable browser, Netscape, which allowed easier access to electronic commerce. Besides that, the development of DSL was another key moment in the development to of e-commerce. DSL allowed quicker access and a persistent connection to the Internet.

The development of Red Hat Linux was also the major step in electronic commerce growth. Linux gave users another choice in a platform other then Windows that was reliable and open-source. Microsoft faced with this competition needed to invest more in many things including electronic commerce.

Napster was an online application used to share music files for free. This application was yet another major step in e-commerce. Many consumers used the site and were dictating what they wanted from the industry. A major merger, in early 2000, between AOL and Time Warner was another major push for electronic commerce. The merger, worth $350 million, brought together a major online company with a traditional company. In February 2000 hackers attacked some major players of e-commerce, including Yahoo, Ebay and Amazon. In light of these attacks the need for improved security came to the forefront in the development of electronic commerce.
It is predicted that that revenues, up until 2006, will grow 40% to 50% yearly. Expectations of higher prices as well as larger profits for e-commerce business are also present. Also, we will see a larger presence by experienced traditional companies, such as Wal-Mart, on the Internet. It is believed companies in general will take this mixed strategy of having stores online and offline in order to be successful. It can be seen that there will be a large growth in Business-to-Consumer (B2C) e-commerce, which is the online selling to individuals. However, B2C electronic commerce may be the most recognizable there are different varieties.
Today the largest electronic commerce is Business-to-Business (B2B). Businesses involved in B2B sell their goods to other businesses. In 2001, this form of e-commerce had around $700 billion in transactions. Other varieties growing today include Consumer-to-Consumer (C2C) where consumers sell to each other, for example through auction sites. Peer-to-Peer (P2P) is another form of e-commerce that allows users to share resources and files directly.

Timeline
1990: Tim Berners-Lee writes the first web browser, WorldWideWeb, using a NeXT computer.
1992: J.H. Snider and Terra Ziporyn publish Future Shop: How New Technologies Will Change
the Way We Shop and What We Buy. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0312063598.
1994: Netscape releases the Navigator browser in October under the code name Mozilla. Pizza
Hut offers pizza ordering on its Web page. The first online bank opens. Attempts to offer
flower delivery and magazine subscriptions online. Adult materials also becomes
commercially available, as do cars and bikes. Netscape 1.0 is introduced in late 1994 SSL
encryption that made transactions secure.
1995: Jeff Bezos launches Amazon.com and the first commercial-free 24 hour, internet-only
radio stations, Radio HK and NetRadio start broadcasting. Dell and Cisco begin to
aggressively use Internet for commercial transactions. eBay is founded by computer
programmer Pierre Omidyar as AuctionWeb.
1998: Electronic postal stamps can be purchased and downloaded for printing from the Web.
1999: Business.com sold for US $7.5 million to eCompanies, which was purchased in 1997 for US
$149,000. The peer-to-peer filesharing software Napster launches. ATG Stores launches
to sell decorative items for the home online.
2000: The dot-com bust.
2002: eBay acquires PayPal for $1.5 billion. Niche retail companies CSN Stores and
NetShops are founded with the concept of selling products through several targeted
domains, rather than a central portal.
2003: Amazon.com posts first yearly profit.
2007: Business.com acquired by R.H. Donnelley for $345 million.
2008: US eCommerce and Online Retail sales projected to reach $204 billion, an increase of 17
percent over 2007.

An example of an E-Commerce success and its causes

2009-06-18T19:13:00.000-07:00

Amazon.Com Inc. was incorporated in 1994 in the state of Washington and reincorporated in 1996 in the state of Delaware. Amazon.com, Inc., a Fortune 500 company, opened its virtual doors on the World Wide Web in July 1995. The Company and its affiliates operate retail websites and considered a pioneer in online retailing and it was launched by the founder of Amazon.com, Jeff Bezos. Its services are aimed primarily at the consumer – the person who goes online and uses Amazon.com’s website to find a product. Amazon.com, Inc. expanded during the late 1990s to offer the "Earth's Biggest Selection" of books, CDs, videos, DVDs, electronics, toys, tools, home furnishings and housewares, kitchen gadgets and a variety of other products.

The reasons that Amazon.com can be success…

E-commerce brought Amazon.com reach globalization which expands the marketplace to national and international market. With minimal capital outlays, Amazon.com can easily and quickly locates the best suppliers, more customers, and the most suitable business partners worldwide. Through Amazon Services, the Company offers Amazon Marketplace and Merchants@ programs that enable third parties to sell its products on its websites, allow customers to shop for products owned by third parties using its features and technologies, and allow individuals to complete transactions that include multiple sellers in a single checkout process.

Amazon.com operates four international Web sites:

Amazon.com is an extended hour’s business which operates on the web in 24 hours per day/7days per week/365 days per year. It make easy and convenience for the online customer to search and buy its product in anytime and anyplace. Therefore, it may have lower communication cost which communicate with their customers and business partners via the Internet is much cheaper and faster as compared to traditional telephone lines.

Amazon.com provides up-to-date material information frequently, so it can be found in the website for its customer. For example, 21^st June 09’ is Father’s Day, Amazon.com promote and sell its product with free two-day shipping and no minimum purchase is requested.

Looking for a Father's gift at Amazon.com in Father's Day

Amazon: E-Commerce Success Story

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/07/05/tech/main706351.shtml

E-Commerce - Amazon - 1 Click Shopping
http://wiki.media-culture.org.au/index.php/Amazon_-_1_Click_Shopping