How to safeguard your personal and financial data?

Internet is a public network that connecting millions of computers throughout the world and there are millions of dollar traded through the internet daily. Moreover the electronic mail (e-mail) sent to another person passes several individual computers before it reaches the destination. So there is every possibility for hackers to gain control of the data. Hence, personal and financial data of individual is actually exposed to threat from being steal or tampered. Therefore, how do you safeguard your personal and financial data? Do you have proper safeguards for your data?

Here there are few suggested approaches on how to safeguard our personal and financial data:

1.Password protect.

• Use a strong password or pass-phrase to protect access to your data. Eg, choose a password that is longer than 8 characters with one capital letter and one symbol.
• Refrain from using Only Names or Numbers and Personal Information. Information Week shows that 16% likes to uses name and 14% likes "1234" or "12345678" and 4% even use password as their password.
• Never provide your password over e-mail or based on an e-mail request.
• Change your passwords regularly.
• Use different password for different website. (But remember what password you have used for each website!)

2.Install and update antispyware, antivirus programs and a firewall.

• Protect yourself against malicious malware that may steal or modify the data on your own computer and leave you vulnerable.
• With up-to-date security software, individual could able to rest their mind in peace from worrying on any malicious software attack.

3.Limit physical access and Restrict network or shared access.

• Allow only authorized individuals access to those devices, and monitor access to those devices whenever possible.
• Do not allow anyone access to sensitive/personal data unless they specifically require access.

4.Avoid accessing financial information in public.

• Resist logging on to check your bank balance when working from a coffee shop that offers wireless access. These systems are convenient, but also unknown. Casual users have no way of assessing how sturdy their firewalls are.

5.Match your receipts to your billing statement each month.

• Make sure you have not been billed for fraudulent purchases.

For more information, pls refer to:

• Internet Security - Safeguard Your Personal and Financial Data
• Safeguarding Your Data
• Six Ways to Safeguard Your Online Assets
• Password Security
• Strong passwords: How to create and use them
• 33% Use a Single Password for Everything

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

Nowadays, we cannot deny that internet technology has improved the quality of our lives. However, we are facing the threat of online security too. Computer users tend to worry about their personal data to be leak out and used in negative purposes. On the other hand, organizations are worried about the online security too.

Today, computer users are facing the threats of cybercrime, internet and network attacks such as computer viruses, worms and Trojan horses and back doors.

A virus is a program that attach itself to a legitimate program to penetrate to the operating system and destroy application programs, data files, and the operating system itself.

A worm is a software program that virtually burrows into the computer’s memory and replicates itself into areas of idle memory. The worm systematically occupies idle memory until the memory us exhausted and the system fails.

Trojan Horse is a program whose purpose is to capture IDs and passwords from unsuspecting users. These programs are designed to mimic the normal log-on procedures of the operating system. The author of Trojan Horse uses these IDs and passwords to access the system and masquerade as an authorized user.

However, as the technology grow along quickly, the security requirement has been increased to protect the safety of the information. The security requirements are summarized into 3 category namely Confidentiality, Integrity, and Authentication.

Confidentiality makes sure that a message is kept confidential such that only intended recipient can access it. Encryption is a favourite tool to provided confidentiality.

Integrity is aiming to ensure that if the content of a message is altered, the receiver can detect it. Thus, when the payment information is changed, the message is no longer valid.

Authentication is about verification of the identity where the identity of the company can be verified before carrying out a transaction. In an open c-commerce system, a digital certificate is used to satisfy the authentication requirement.

Besides that, the best way users can do if they get on the Internet at all is to use security software and hardware such as firewalls and authentication servers, as this is the most effective approach to protect the computer and their personal information

In conclusion, safeguards developed must be always up to date to enhance the defences against online security threats. By the way, users must be educated and informed about the crucial damages and loss caused by imposing online security threats.

The application of third party cerification programme in Malaysia

What is Third Party Certification?

Third Party Certification is act as a certificate authorities (CAs), who issue digital certificate to provide verification that your website does indeed represent your company.It used to provide the trust on your web pages and provide security measurement purpose. Data is restricted only to authorized individuals in conformity with its disclosed security.

Malaysia also have it own third party certification company,which is MSC Trustgate.com Sdn Bhd.MSC Trustgate was incorporated in 1999 to meet the growing need for secure open network communications and become the catalyst for the growth of e-commerce, both locally and across the ASEAN region.Trustgate is licensed under the Digital Signature Act 1997 (DSA),which it was required by Malaysia Law .

Trustgate’s core business is to provide digital certification services, including digital certificates, cryptographic products, and software development.This services is mention for individuals, organizations, government, and e-commerce service providers.

The product that also been offered by MSC Trustgate is SSL Certificate,Managed PKI, Personal ID,My TRUST,MyKAD ID,SSL VPN,Managed Security Services VeriSign Certified Training and Application Development.

Why the Third Party Certificate is needed?

The reason behind of it is, there are threats of internet security happen each day. Example for the biggest threat is happen in Y2K. It been affected the computer database from around the world, and reported cost the effected company Millon of Dollars in businesses.With the exist of this certificate user will be able to make transaction online without worried feared that their particular such as ID, Password, and private imformation been will been stolen by other unresponsible party.

In conclusion, third party certification program is important to the internet user to secure their privacy , prevent the confidential information or personal data being stolen during the transaction on Internet.

Phishing: Examples and its prevention methods

What is Phishing?

Phishing is a fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information such as usernames, passwords and credit card details by masquerading as a trustworthy entity in an electronic communication.

Examples of Phishing
1. eBay:

On 17 November 2003, many eBay customers received email notified that their accounts had been compromised and were being restricted. After clicking the hyperlink provided in the email, a web page which just looked like the same as eBay’s home page appeared. To re-register, the customer were told to provide credit card data, ATM personal identification numbers, Social Security number, date of birth and their mother’s maiden name. However, the problems was eBay did not send the email and the webpage did not belong to eBay.



2. Citibank:

The "From Field" appears to be from the legitimate company mentioned in the e-mail. However, that it is very simple to change the "from" information in any e-mail client. The e-mail will usually contain logos or images that have been taken from the Web site of the company mentioned in the scam e-mail.

The e-mail will contain a clickable link with text suggesting you use the inserted link to validate your information. In the image you will see that once the hyperlink is highlighted, the bottom left of the screen shows the real Web site address to which you will go. Note that the hyperlink does NOT point to the legitimate Citibank Web site URL.

In this instance, the text you click is "here". However, this may also state something like "Log-in to Citibank" or "www.citibank.com/secure" to be even more misleading. This clickable area is only text and can be changed to anything the sender wants it to read.

Additionally, you may spot some of these elements that did not appear in this particular scam:
Logos that are not an exact match to the company's logo, spelling errors, percentage signs followed by numbers or @ signs within the hyperlink, random names or e-mail addresses in the body of the text, or even e-mail headers which have nothing to do with the company mentioned in the e-mail.

How to prevent it?

1. Never click directly on any link from your e-mail. Be suspicious when you have come to a message that requires account verification.
2. Use strong password and do not use the same password for more than one site. Change it frequently.
3. Use anti-virus and anti-spyware software, as well as a firewall, and update them all regularly.

4. Review credit card and bank account statements as soon as you receive them to check for unauthorized charges.

5. Stay alert and be cautious with the e-mail and on Websites.

Hopefully all this information can help all the users to be alert from the phishers.

Identify and compare the revenue model for Google, Amazon.com and eBay.

Do you know what is Revenue Model is??
Revenue Model is a description of how the organization or e-commerce companies will earn revenue, generate profits, and produce a superior return on invested capital. The FIVE (5) major revenue models are sales, transaction fees, subscription fees, advertising fees, affiliate fees, and other revenue sources.

So do you know what the revenue model is for Google, amazon.com and eBay?

Google's which is more recognized for its world's largest search engine and the mission to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful. In a fraction of seconds it provides easy-to-use free service that usually returns relevant results. However, although Google is providing free services, they generate profit through advertising. Their profit from advertisement is through two type of revenue model which are “pay-per-click advertisement” and “per-thousand-ads-displayed”.

Pay-per-click advertisement is a model that charges the advertiser in Google whenever their ads are being click. Moreover the fees is set by the amount that the advertiser willing to pay. Google will accumulate the amount of click on the advertisement and only will charge the advertiser when the amount reaches a certain sum. The “per-thousand-ads-displayed" for instance will help Google to charge the advertiser for every thousand advertisement that appear on the website.

To fully put the two revenue models into action, Google with the assistance of two programmes, the AdWords and AdSense. This two programmes helps Google generates revenue by providing advertisers with the opportunity to deliver measurable, cost-effective online advertising that is relevant to the information displayed on any given page. This makes the advertising useful to you as well as to the advertiser placing it. Thousands of advertisers use Google AdWords program to promote their products and services on the web with targeted advertising and almost 90% of the Google revenue is generated from AdWords programme. In addition, thousands of web site managers take advantage of our Google AdSense program to deliver ads relevant to the content on their sites, improving their ability to generate revenue and enhancing the experience for their users.

For more information, please refers to:
Google about me
Google's Revenue Model

Amazon.com, a Fortune 500 company based in Seattle, Washington, is the global leader in e-commerce with offers everything from books and electronics to tennis rackets and diamond jewelry at even lower prices. Moreover, Amazon.com are more conveniently and offering customers with more types of products, several community features like Listmania and Wish Lists that help customers to discover new products and make informed buying decisions. Amazon generates its revenue through:


Transaction fees - $ 0.99 (per-transaction)
Commission - the rate of commission is vary on different types of merchandise
Variable closing fee - the price is vary from different type of merchandise



Amazon will helps the collect money from the buyer and commission will be taken from the money collected and other feels will be charged on the seller account. Thus, amazon is actually a third party between seller and buyer that help them meet and close transaction and amazon collect commission from and some fees.

For more information, please refers to:
About Amazon
Fees and Pricing

Ebay is the world's largest online marketplace where practically anyone can sell practically anything at any time. It's an idea that BusinessWeek once called "nothing less than a virtual, self-regulating global economy." Ebay generate their revenue through fees charged on the seller which include insertion fees and final value fees.

Ebay will charge the seller insertion fees which is also called listing fees is fees when seller list their item for sales and this fee is charged at the time of listing. In addition, this fees is not refundable even the item until the expiry of listing date is still unable to be sold. On the other hand, final value fees are also transaction fees, when the item listed successfully bid, Ebay will charged on a certain rate against the final value of the bid to the seller’s account as a commission fees. The rate for the final value fees vary according to the type of product that are list for bid.

For more information, please refers to:
About eBay
Ebay.com listing fees
Insertion Fees
Final Value Fees

The successful e-commerce company such as Google, amazon.com and Ebay are prospering in this technology and online world. Each of this company is having their own revenue model that suits the environment and business nature in order to generate profit. However, each of this revenue models might not or could not work on another company. For example, Google which is earns their through advertising are unlikely to be usable for amazon.com and Ebay which their nature of business are skewed towards transaction. For Ebay, their revenue model is different from amazon.com in terms of fees charges that they incurred on the seller. As Ebay is an online auction company, they charge the seller for listing their merchandise. On the other hand, amazon.com which is dealing with business transactions, would need to charge their seller for successful business transaction.

The history and evolution of Ecommerce

History of ecommerce dates back to the invention of the very old notion of “sell and buy”, electricity, cables, computers, modems, and the Internet. At first, the term ecommerce meant the process of execution of commercial transactions electronically with the help of the leading technologies such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) for users to exchange business information and do electronic transactions. The ability to use these technologies appeared in the late 1970s and allowed business companies and organizations to send commercial documentation electronically. After that, the credit cards, automated teller machines (ATM), online airline reservation, and telephone banking in the 1980s were also known as types of electronic commerce. From the 1990s onwards, electronic commerce would additionally include enterprise resource planning systems (ERP), data mining and data warehousing. Online shopping was invented in the UK in 1979 by Michael Aldrich and during the 1980s it was used extensively particularly by auto manufacturers such as Ford, Peugeot-Talbot, General Motors and Nissan.

Although the Internet began to advance in popularity among the general public in 1994, it took approximately four years to develop the security protocols (for example, HTTP) and DSL which allowed rapid access and a persistent connection to the Internet. In 2000 a great number of business companies in the United States and Western Europe represented their services in the World Wide Web. People began to define the term ecommerce as the process of purchasing of available goods and services over the Internet using secure connections and electronic payment services. Amazon and Ebay were among the first Internet companies to allow electronic transactions. Currently there are 5 largest and most famous worldwide Internet retailers: Amazon, Dell, Staples, Office Depot and Hewlett Packard.

The growth of Internet has a special significance in the growth of e-commerce. It has the potential to involve general people into the process, thereby increasing its reach far beyond large companies.

An example of an E-Commerce success and its causes

Online shopping brings a lot of convenience to the consumers. In Malaysia, more and more people start to purchase something online such as clothes, electronic products or even pets. eBay offers boundless opportunity to allow people pursue their interests and their passions in the areas of their hobbies and their collectibles.

eBay has built an online person-to-person trading community on the Internet, using the World Wide Web. Buyers and sellers are brought together in a manner where sellers are permitted to list items for sale, buyers to bid on items of interest and all eBay users to browse through listed items in a fully automated way. The items are arranged by topics, where each type of auction has its own category. It's convenient and easy to be found by people. This facilitates easy exploration for buyers and enables the sellers to immediately list an item for sale within minutes of registering.

eBay has done a regular basis to promote eBay, they have had isolated campaigns through radio and print, and they've also done some tradeoffs and some banner ads on other sites. But the really unique thing about eBay is that when compare theirs to traditional businesses or other e-commerce sites, they have done very little external promotion to build membership.

Another cause has helped to make eBay as successful as it has been, is that people really enjoy the experience of the shopping bazaar. They enjoy looking around for merchandise. The other component is they really enjoy the competition of the bidding process. Everybody likes to get a bargain, and shape or form, likes to haggle a little bit over the price. eBay's auction format allows users to do that.


Obviously, people are becoming more and more comfortable with shopping online and they're getting more and more accustomed to doing that. That's another factor why eBay is grateful.


References:
http://www.cs.brandeis.edu/~magnus/ief248a/eBay/history.html

An example of an E-commerce failure and its causes

As we know, there are not all E-Commerce business successful like Amazon.com, AOL, eBay and Dell just to name a few. However there are also those that did not quite get it right and sunk badly. One of an example of an E-Commerce failure is webvan.com.

About Webvan


Webvan was an online “credit and delivery’ grocery business that was founded by Louis Borders, the same man that established Borders book store .It delivered product to customers’ homes within a 30-minute window of their choosing.Webvan began its operation on 2 June, 1999, went bankrupt and closed down by 2001. In June 2008, CNET hailed Webvan as one of the greatest dotcom disasters in history.

Factors that cause Webvan failure

Types of product

Most of the product sell in Webvan are F&B product like food.Shopper may also price sensitive on the product where Webvan had to include extra labor cost and shipping cost on the product. So discount of the grocery product, the expire dates and the price of the product are the factor that effect consumer decision whether buy online or buy through retail shop.

Logistic

It is not easy to convenience all customer at the same time. Scheduling the time to delivery is not easy job for a logistic department of Webvan. If the company want to schedule all the delivery process well where the company able to send to product in time and able to save company cost it take days to complete. So it is a challenge for logistic department to do well. If the company unable to send the product to their customer on time, this will effect the consumer loyalty to the company.

Delivery on the time that the customer needed it

The advantage of Webvan is that they will deliver to your home after you place the order. But the problem is that Webvan unable to completely send to you when you need it now and the delivery cost might be more expensive then the product. Product like fresh vegetable and fruit may no fulfill the consumer need where the customers unable get the goods on time where they need it.

This is on of our group example of a failure E-Commerce business. If you felt you have any opinion or suggestion. Don’t hesitate to post comment.

References:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webvan
http://www.webvan.com/

Something about Me

Hi everyone, I’ m ying ying, a 21 years old girl who came from Malacca. In my family, we there are four member which consist of my parents, my brother and me. I am the eldest among my sibling. Currently, I am a student who studying in UTAR Sg. Long campus for Bachelor Degree of Commerce (Hons) Accounting.

Well, actually this is my first time to write blog. During my free time, I usually enjoy reading novel, watch movies, and go shopping with my friends, listening to songs and play online games.

The tops 5 website that I visited most was
1) www.hotmail.com
Everyday I will go to this website to check mail o forward some funny or interesting mail to my friends.

2) www.friendster.com
I will go to this website quite often to view my friends profile and look at their new upload picture.

3) www.baidu.com
Normally I will download songs from this website because it is free and very easy to search for the song I wanted. Beside, I also use to search for information and use the translations dictionary.

4) www.readnovel.com
Due to my hobbies of reading novel, I will visit this website to read the online novel when I was bored.

5) www.google.com
I normally go Google.com to search for new information and journal for my thesis use.


Furthermore, surfing the internet is part of my duty for everyday already. I will search the net for getting my related journal, article, and information for my assignment or thesis, plays online games when I am bored with my stuff, on my msn to chat with my friends or share some information with them. Beside, I will start to download the movie or songs from the net because it is free.

Anyways, welcome to leave any comments in our blogs. Thank for your supports.

Hui Khee's Profile

I am Yong Hui Khee born in Sungai Petani, Kedah, i received my primary education at Kong Ming Primary School, Tawar, and my secondary study until Form Five at Batu Pekaka Secondary School, Kuala Ketil. Thereafter I enrolled to Tunku Abdul Rahman College (KTAR) in Penang Branch Campus. At KTAR, and received Diploma in Business Studies (Accounting). Currently persuing the Bachelor of Commerce (Hons) Accounting at University Tunku Abdul Rahman. I like to watch Hong Kong, Singapore drama and Taiwan entertainment programme and travelling.

The top five websites that I visited the most are:

1. www.google.com or www.yahoo.com

2. www.utar.edu.my

3. www.hotmail.com

4. www.guangming.com.my

5. www.facebook.com

The Google and Yahoo website is one of top website that I visited because I always use this website searching the information for assignment purposes or any others.

For UTAR website, as student have to visit this website frequently to check the latest news or events about the University. In addition, I will using the portal to view the timetable when beginning of each semester, check the examination timetable when final examination is coming, check the final examination result, exercise the unit verification etc.

I visited Yahoo and Hotmail website because I need to check and send mail through my email account especially forward email to my friends and received email from my friends. These two website is useful because it is more convenient and faster than mail by post and save cost due to without using paper.

Guangming website is Chinese Newspaper Website available for public to visit without any registration as member. Normally I will using this website to read the news same as reading the newspaper and can get to know variety of news like nation, world update, business, entertainment, education, technology, lifestyle and so on without buying the newspaper.

For Facebook, keeping in touch with friends and getting to know about their updates.

Mei Ching's Profile

My name is Hua Mei Ching. I am 21 years old. My family consists of 6 members including myself. I have three sisters. My hobby is singing and listening to music. I like to sing since I was five years old. For me, music can make me feel relax. So, I will listen some music when I feel stress or in bad mood.

I come from a small town called Asahan which located in Melaka. Asahan is a small town which is near the mountain called “Gunung Ledang”. Gunung Ledang is commonly known as among the locals for its mystical character and as a camping destination rather than a hill resort. Mysticism aside, the mountain is a natural beauty with its challenging mountain trails, icy waterfalls, cascades, diverse birdlife, flora and fauna. Straddling the Johor/Melaka border, Gunung Ledang is the highest mountain in the two southern states and can be accessed either via the Melaka or Johor route.

The top 5 websites that are visited the most by me are http://www.google.com/, http://www.yahoo.com/, http://www.youtube.com/, wble.utar.edu.my, and http://www.facebook.com/. The website I most visits is Google.com and I actually set this website as my home page. I always use it for searching information for my assignments and homework. I like this website because most of the information that I want can easily find in this website. Therefore, I think Google.com is very useful for me and helping me a lot in searching information.

Besides that, Yahoo is another website that I usually use for searching information and web searching. I always visit this website for checking my mail also. Actually, I quite like this website. It is because it consists of many things includes music, movie, mobile, shopping, sports, travel and others. All these are updated so we can always know the newest songs and music, mobile, movies and others.

Next, wble is the website I often visit too. I think it is not strange for all UTAR students and staffs. I always visit this website to download lecture notes and tutorial which is posted by lecturer. I also visit this website to get the newest information from my lecturers.

On the other hand, I love to visit YouTube to watch the most viewed videos uploaded on YouTube. I like to visit YouTube to watch music videos uploaded. It is free and we can free download the video clip if we like.

The last website in top 5 websites I visited the most is facebook. From this website, I can make more friends. Most of my friends have sign up facebook account, so I can contact and chatting with them in facebook. However, facebook provides several of games. We can play these games together with our friends and it is quite fun. So, I will visit to facebook when I am free.

Jermine's Profile

Hi and welcome to visit our blog. Let me briefly introduce myself. My name is Jermine Ang Chen Swang.I come from Johor, Tangkak. I'm UTAR student and currently pursuing Bachelor of Commerce (Hons) Accounting at Sg long campus.

I'm a very honest and friendly person. I enjoy reading interesting books, watching funny movies, go shopping with my friends. Sometime go to Jusco Green box at Balakong with my friends to sing to reduce stress and improved mood for study. Unfortunately, I don't have much time to shopping with my friends now because I sacrificed my free time to learn.


The top 5 websites that I have the most visits are:
1. http://www.google.com/
Google is the website I visited almost because it is my homepage and I usually find information through Google

2. http://www.facebook.com
I prefers facebook because a lot of my friends constantly upload photos to facebook, and it is great to see these photos, as it is instantly updated in the facebook. It is very easy to keep track of people status’s.

3. http://www.hotmail.com/
It is because hotmail is my primary e-mail and I usually login to check mail.

4. http://www.friendster.com/
I also login friendster everyday because I usually send birthday testimonial to my net friend.

5. http://www.youtube.com/
The website that I visited the most is youtube because I usually online watching the movie without download.


The top 5 internet activities that I often do are:

1. Communication
Using window live messenger (MSN) to chat with all my friends.

2. Mailing
I usually check mail and send mail to my friends.

3. Search for information
When doing assignment, I will online search information to support and solve the problem we faced.

4. Uploading Photo
I often upload photo in friendster and facebook for updating.

5. Playing online game
The most I like is play online game in facebook ( restaurant city, pet society and farm town game)


Thanks for viewing my profile. Welcome to leave comment to our blog!

Who we are?

The four of us in this U e-commerce blog are:

Tutorial group 5

Name: Hua Mei Ching

Name: Jermine Ang Chen Swang

Name: Yap Ying Ying

Name: Yong Hui Khee

The first time to write blog…..

Hi, everyone nice to see you here! It's our first time to
write blog in English.Our objectives for this blog is to
write about the application of e-commerce in the daily life
at home or at workplace and have a basis understanding about
e-commerce around the world. We also hope that this blog
can share all thought and knowledge about the e-commerce
with all people in our daily life. We would be glad if you post
comment to us about e-commerce blog that we update every week.

Welcome to visit our blog!