Managing System Security

       Information system Risk

1-      Human Errors

Human error is a mistake made by a person rather than being caused by a poorly designed process or the malfunctioning of a machine such as a computer(design of hardware, programming, testing and authorization).

2-      Environmental hazards

Environment are the things around. Environmental hazard is the risk of damage to the environment eg air pollution, water pollution, toxins, radioactivity. Smoke, heat and water damage resulting from the other environment hazards.

3-      Computer system failures

Computer system failures is a hardware or operating system malfunction such as poor design

4-      Intentional threat

Intentional threat is a potential for violation of security, which exists when there is an                 entity, circumstance, capability, action, or event such as fraud and crims related to the use of the internet.

5-      cyber crime

Cyber-crime is criminal activity done using computers and the Internet. This includes anything from downloading illegal music files to stealing millions of dollars from online bank accounts. Cyber-crime also includes non-monetary offenses, such as creating and distributing viruses on other computers or posting confidential business information on the Internet.

Preventive control system

1-      access control

Access Control is any mechanism by which a system grants or revokes the right to access some data, or perform some action. Normally, a user must first Login to a system, using some Authentication system. Next, the Access Control mechanism controls what operations the user may or may not make by comparing the User ID to an Access Control database.

2-      Encryption

Encryption is The coding of a clear text message by a transmitting unit so as to prevent unauthorized eavesdropping along the transmission line; the receiving unit uses the same algorithm as the transmitting unit to decode the incoming message.

3-      Virus protection

Virus protection ia a computer program that is designed to replicate itself by copying itself into the other programs stored in a computer. It may be benign or have a negative effect, such as causing a program to operate incorrectly or corrupting a computer's memory.

4-      Firewall

Firewall is any of a number of security schemes that prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to a computer network or that monitor transfers of information to and from the network.

Internal audit Vs External audit

The external auditors issue an opinion on the fairness of the financial statements taken as a whole. The internal auditors are regular employees of the company they audit. Internal audits generally examine internal controls and the main purpose is to recommend improvements in efficiency and operational effectiveness. The materiality level for an internal audit is much lower than for an external audit. An external auditor will never examine petty cash, but an internal auditor will.

The external auditors are organizationally independent - they work for a completely different company than the company being audited. The also get paid more - the internal auditors receive their regular salary, regardless of their findings. The external auditors get paid based on their contract which includes expenses, overhead and profit.

The external auditors issue an opinion on the fairness of the financial statements taken as a whole. The internal auditors may issue an opinion on a much smaller unit they may be auditing, but often they do not.

External auditors are required to follow generally accepted auditing standards ( or international auditing standards), internal auditors do not. The internal audits may follow GAAS, they may follow IIA standards, or they may not follow any special standard.

An internal audit may cover a time perior of a week, month or quarter. An external audit generally covers a year.

What do you want in future?

I completed my bachelor’s degree in BIT and then continue my study and completed my master's degree in MBA. joined ABC in the Audit & Business Advisory Department. I believed that a career with an accounting firm would serve me in two ways: first, by enhancing my knowledge of accounting -the language of business- and second, by providing me with an excellent introduction to the business world. My decision seemed to be a sound one; in my first two years at ABC, I worked on a wide variety of assignments that not only strengthened my analytical and problem-solving skills, but also taught me how large businesses managed their sourcing, manufacturing, and distribution functions. After enjoying this productive and educational experience for two years, I decided I wanted greater opportunities than what the audit department could offer.

Thus, when the Management Assurance Services (MAS) practice was established in Iran, the challenge of working in a new service line and the opportunity to help improve the risk management mechanisms of businesses influenced me to join it. In the last three years, I have improved risk management capabilities of clients by addressing strategic, enterprise and operational risk issues. I have also assisted the MAS practice in tailoring our international portfolio of services to the Iranian marketplace by conducting risk management surveys, interacting with professionals in other developing economies, and conducting interviews with senior client management. Besides becoming skilled at process risk consulting, I have also significantly improved my project management and ‘new service’ development abilities in the last three years.

A Rural tale

- Lack of User Involvement: 
One of the main reasons IT projects fail is that users do not participate in the system development process to the extent that they should. One reason, although by no means the only one, is the lack of participation in the project by those who will use the system when it is finished.
- Unrealistic Expectations:

- Technology Illiteracy: 
 
- Communication:

..............

After identifying the problem faced by the villagers, the foreign aid workers should do some survey or questionnaire on what they wanted for improvement and is the pipe the best suited solution for them and will they accept it for it will not disrupt their daily routines. 

Due to the insufficient knowledge in rural villagers, videos or some simple details and explanation  on the advantage of this system may bring should be demonstrated to the villagers so that they can learn to adapt and accept taps, because it can help to improve their live.

Communication is another problem as based on this story, there is nobody from the home country to help the foreign aid workers to communicate with them. With language and style as a barrier, they might face difficulties to deliver the good message to them.

In this story, the problem faced by the foreign aid workers is that they are facing villagers from a developing country which means the people is not educated well enough to understand what good technology will bring to them. Changes made by the foreign aid workers might not bring out good response but them but instead a negative response due to their conservative mind that do not accept changes in their lifestyle.

After the implementation of the system, there is nobody to educate them how to operate the pipes. Due to their lack of knowledge and exposure in technology, it will hinder them from utilizing it to its full potential.

  

 

Walmart Inventory System Management

Walmart Inventory System

     Inventory management systems are the rule for such enterprises, but smaller businesses and vendors use them, too. The systems ensure customers always have enough of what they want and balance that goal against a retailer's financial need to maintain as little stock as possible. Mismanaged inventory means disappointed customers, too much cash tied up in warehouses and slower sales. Factors such as quicker production cycles, a proliferation of products, multi-national production contracts and the nature of the big-box store make them a necessity.

     Modern inventory management systems must have the ability to track sales and available inventory, communicate with suppliers in near real-time and receive and incorporate other data, such as seasonal demand. They also must be flexible, allowing for a merchant's intuition. And, they must tell a storeowner when it's time to reorder and how much to purchase.

     An inventory control system is a process for managing and locating objects or materials

     Modern inventory control systems often rely upon barcodes and RFID tags to provide automatic identification of inventory objects. In an academic study performed at Wal-Mart, RFID reduced Out of Stocks by 30 percent for products selling between 0.1 and 15 units a day. Inventory objects could include any kind of physical asset: merchandise, consumables, fixed assets, circulating tools, library books, or capital equipment. To record an inventory transaction, the system uses a barcode scanner or RFID reader to automatically identify the inventory object, and then collects additional information from the operators via fixed terminals (workstations), or mobile computers.\

It also Applies to lead time management. Reduce liabilities, and Supply and demand.

Some advantages are:

     First of all, Wal- Mart contains low priced goods. As a result, people can save their money because they can find many items cheaper in Wal-Mart than other supermarkets, especially; the basic needs for families such a sugar, soda, vegetables and fruit. For example, the box of Coca-Cola in Wal-Mart is 6.00 dollars but in other supermarkets are almost 7.00 dollars. In addition, because it is cheap, Wal-Mart is good for a big family. People can buy more quantities of their basic’s needs


     Second, Wal-Mart is convenient. People can find everything for their needs in Wal-Mart. Actually, American’s can find most of their basic needs such as milk, bread, fruit and vegetables or their secondary needs such as perfumes and watches in Wal-Mart because the branches of Wal-Mart are usually big. Also, they can find Wal-Mart in many cities and towns in America. That means Wal-Mart is available in big cities like New York, middle cities like Kansas City and small cities like Carbondale. As a result, people when move to another city because their change their work or their university, they can find big supermarket that contains their needs.


     Third, Wal-Mart has good services. For example, people can return any item that they bought. So if someone bought a vacuum and it was not appropriate for him or for her, he or she can return it. Also, Wal-Mart has enough parking.



     In conclusion, because Wal-Mart is convenient, has low prices and has good services, people should be happy when Wal-Mart decides to open more branches through the World,Walmartt does have a great beneficial advantage in business.



References:

http://communication.howstuffworks.com/how-inventory-management-systems-work.htm


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inventory_control_system

http://www.inventorymanagementreview.org/2006/04/walmart_increas.html

http://www.docstoc.com/docs/9517882/Wal-Mart-Database

Websites Review

Based on the overall view of all of this website, the rank of the website according to my research :

1^st. www.milkadeal.com

2^nd. www.groupsmore.com

3^rd. www.jackcow.com

4^th. www.superdeal.com

    All of these websites are the e commerce implemented organization because they are doing their businesses through internet. The business that they are doing here is selling the reasonable price deal to users using internet.

    The strategy for all of this website are basically good. First, they let the user to see all the deal that they have, then the users will choose the deal and spread the website to their friend, then the users will do the payment online. By asking the user to spread their website with their friend through internet has bring a big opportunity for the website to let the other users from all over the world know about them. All websites also has the time counting functionality to let the users know how long the deal will still be available. The others functionality that all these websites offer is subscription to user’s email to let them about the new deal.

Besides that, the layout and interface for each websites are also good whether it is from their font size, the color mix, and the design.  

Compare and Contrast:

     The reason why I choose Milkadeal.com as the 1^st rank is because they provides better functionality and interface for users than others. They have added another interface for user which is language selection. By using language selection, the users can choose which language they know well.

They also provide functionality for users to discuss with each other for particular promotion. By this functionality, users can easily interact with each other to talk about the particular promotion.

     Milkadeal.com and groupsmore.com together have the other functionality which is registering to this website using their facebook account so that they don’t need to sign up and filling the form again and again. Some user sometimes will leave the website once they ask them to register by filling the form. By providing this functionality provides user a simplicity in becoming website’s member and bring opportunity for the organization from lossing their users and adding their member.

     Why I choose superdeal.com to be the last website? Superdeal.com is basically a good website also. But compared to the others, superdeal.com has less functionality and interface for their users. In the other 3 websites, the users can subscribe according to their city so website will send the particular promotion from their city directly to their email. They can also see the promotion that are available in their city by choosing the city in the website while superdeal.com doesn’t offer this functionality.

Difficulties and Suggestion:

     The difficulties I found in all websites is the users need to scroll down and down again to see each deal even the deal that they don’t want to see. The users also cannot search for particular deal that they want (e.g. if they want to look for deal in food category). My suggestion in this problem is for each website to provides a list for all deals. This list should have a flexibility, example: user can choose which deal available in this date or the latest deal, oldest deal, category of the deal, etc. Once they choose, the list should show all the deals based on user’s requirements and once the users click on the particular deal, they will direct the users to see the complete page about information of the deal.

Old-economy Vs New-economy

Old-economy stand for  large and well-established companies that contirbute in more traditional industry area and have little investment or involvement in the technology industry. New-economy stocks are greatly involved in the technology area and the more successful companies are able to build value at obviously higher growth rates.

Old- and new-economy stocks vary not only in their business activities but also in the way they are valued by the market. Valuations of new-economy stocks have a tendency to see stronger stability, since their business models are not as stable as old-economy stocks. In the other words, old-economy stocks have a tendency to be valued based on more stable business models and less strong growth expectations.

Dell Inc, a great example for Digital Economy

Dell Inc was one of the first companies began using the Internet to expand their business. For Dell, online commerce was only the beginning, they started to view the ownership of information differently. They used Internet browsers to essentially provide information to they customers and suppliers to bringing them literally inside the business. Dell become a virtually integrated organization. In the other words an organization linked not by physical assets, but by information. By using the Internet to speed information from between companies, essentially eliminating inter-company boundaries, it would be possible to achieve precision and speed-to-market for products and services in ways that was not  possible before.