Chapter 3: Threats to Information Security

Q1. Provide an IT example that relates to the ethical issues for the ideas of privacy, accuracy, property, and accessibility.



Facebook is a global social networking website that is operated and privately owned by Facebook, Inc. Users can add friends and send them messages, and update their personal profiles to notify friends about themselves. Additionally, users can join networks organized by city, workplace, school, and region. Privacy has been an issue, and it has been compromised several times. Facebook was charged by the administration with breach of security, violating copyrights and violating individual privacy and faced expulsion. It was also claimed by the developer’s classmates that he had stolen their source code and other intellectual property. This shows that this website includes all problems of ethical issues, accessibility is also part of the issue as hacking into other people’s accounts takes place all the time.

Q2. What are the 4 general types of IT threats? Provide an example for each one



The four main general types of IT threats include:
1. Unintentional acts: those with no malicious intent and include human errors, deviations in the quality of service by service providers and environmental hazards. Example, shoulder surfing.

2. Natural disasters: include floods, earthquakes, hurricanes, and static electricity.
3. Technical failures: include problems with hardware and software. Example a crash of a hard disc.
4. Management failures: involve a lack of funding for information security efforts and a lack of interest in those efforts.

Q3. Describe/discuss three types of software attack and a problem that may result from them




 Virus: segment of computer code that performs malicious actions by attaching to another computer program. The other computer will spread this virus by sending it to another without knowing, this may result in a re-format for all computers and loss of data and saved information.
 Logic bomb: segment of computer code that is embedded with an organization’s existing computer programs and is designed to activate and perform a destructive action at a certain time or date.
 Denial-of-service Attack: attackers sends so many information requests to a target cannot handle them successfully and typically crashes (i.e., ceases to function).

Q4. Describe the four major types of security controls in relation to protecting information systems.

 Physical Controls: prevent unauthorized individuals from gaining access to a company’s facilities.
 Access Controls: restrict unauthorized individuals from using information resources.
 Communications Controls: or network controls secure the movement of data across networks.
 Application Controls: as their name suggests, are security counter-measures that protect specific applications.

Q5. Name one recent software threat and briefly discuss its effects and resolutions?

Human errors is a type of unintentional acts that are affecting software. It is comprised of regular employees, who span the breadth and depth of the organization, ranging from mail clerks to the CEO, and in all functional areas. The higher the level of employees, the greater the threat the employee poses to information security because higher-level employees typically have greater access to corporate data and enjoy greater privileges on organizational information systems. Human errors or mistakes by employees caused by laziness, carelessness, or lack of information security awareness pose a large problem for organizations. This lack of awareness comes from poor education and training efforts by the organization, this is resolved by effort put in from managers to fix this problem by educating their workers and limiting their access and privileges.





Q6. What is the difference between authentication and authorization and why are they important to e-Commerce/give an example of their relevance to e-Commerce

Authentication is a process that determines the identity of the person requiring access. Authenticate someone means something the user is, something the user has, something the user does and something the user knows. Authorization determines which actions, rights, or privileges the person has, based on verified identity. Organizations use methods to identify authorized personnel.

Tech Guide 2: Computer Software

Q1. What are main differences/distinction between system software and application software?



Systems software is a set of instructions that serves primarily as an intermediary between computer hardware and application programs. Systems software provides important self-regulatory functions for computer systems. Application software is a set of computer instructions that provide more specific functionality to a user.




Q2. What are the two main types of system software? Provide some examples of their functions.

The two main types of system software are system control programs and system support programs. System control programs control use of the hardware, software, and data resources of a computer system. An example is mobile phones. System support programs are support the operations, management, and users of a computer system by providing a variety of support services. Examples include: system utility programs, performance monitors and security monitors.




Q3. What is the difference between proprietary and open source software? What considerations should be made when a business selects either software.

Proprietary application software is one that addresses a specific or unique business need for a company; may be developed in-house or may be commissioned from a software vendor. Open source software is one made available in source code from at no cost to developers. Considerations that should be made when selecting software include: size and location of user base, availability of system, costs (initial and subsequent), system capabilities, existing computing environment, in-house technical skills.

Q4. What are some of the legal issues involved in acquiring and using software in most businesses/organizations?

Software licensing is one of the biggest and most important legal issues involved in acquiring and using software in businesses and organizations. Copying and burning original CD’s is an illegal issue despite the fact that people do it all the time. To protect their investment, software vendors must prevent their software from being copied and distributed by individuals and other software companies. A company can copyright its software, which means that the U.S Copyright Office grants the company the exclusive legal right to reproduce, publish, and sell that software.


Q5. Choose an Operating System, provide some details on its developer, it license type and key benefits.



Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and Douglas McIlroy at Bell Labs designed and developed the C programming language to build the operating system Unix. Unix developed into a large, complex family of inter-related operating systems which have been influential in every modern operating system. The name "UNIX" is a trademark of The Open Group which licenses it for use with any operating system that has been shown to conform to their definitions. AT&T licensed UNIX System III, based largely on Version 7, for commercial use. It is portable, multi-tasking and a multi-user in a time-sharing configuration. Unix systems are characterized by various concepts: the use of plain text for storing data; a hierarchical file system; treating devices and certain types of inter-process communication (IPC) as files; and the use of a large number of software tools, small programs that can be strung together through a command line interpreter using pipes, as opposed to using a single monolithic program that includes all of the same functionality.

Tech Guide 1: Innovations in Hardware Utilization

Q1. What is computer hardware and what are the major hardware components?

Computer hardware is a set of devices that together accept data and information, process them, and display them. The major components of hardware are a processor, monitor, keyboard, printer…

Q2. What is Moore's Law/what does it mean in relation to computers?

Moore’s law is a prediction by Gordon Moore, an Intel co-founder, that microprocessor complexity would double approximately every two years. In relation to computers, it means that innovations in chip designs are coming at a faster and faster rate and his prediction has been accurate.



Q3. In basic terms, describe how a microprocessor functions.




A microprocessor is built on to a single piece of silicon; it may function by itself in a wide range of applications. A microprocessor chip contains a read-only memory (Rom) which can be read repeatedly but cannot be changed. And it may also have some random access memory (RAM) for holding temporary data.




Q4. What factors determine the speed of the microprocessor?

Registers, Random Access Memory (RAM), Cache Memory and Read-only Memory (ROM) are all different factors that determine the speed of the microprocessor as information and data is being saved and retrieved from them.

Q5. What are the four main types of primary storage?

§ Registers: are part of the CPU, they have the least capacity, storing extremely limited amounts of instructions and data only before and after processing.
§ Random Access Memory (RAM): holds a software program and small amounts of data for processing.
§ Cache Memory: a type of high speed memory that enables the computer to temporarily store blocks of data that are used more often and that a processor can access more rapidly than main memory (RAM).
§ Read-only Memory (ROM): certain critical instructions are safeguarded; the storage is nonvolatile and retains the instructions when the power to the computer is turned off.




Q6. What are the main types of secondary storage?



§ Magnetic media
§ Optical storage devices
§ Flash memory devices
§ Redundant arrays of independent disks
§ Storage area network
§ Network-attached storage



Q7. How does primary storage differ from secondary storage in terms of speed cost and capacity?

Primary Storage

• Most primary storage is temporary
• Primary Storage is expensive
  and smaller
• Primary storage is smaller in
  capacity
• Primary storage is usually faster
  therefore more expensive
• Primary storage is closer to the CPU
  and/or is integrated onto it and therefore
  is faster.
• Examples of Primary storage: RAM,
  L2 Cache

Secondary Storage

• All secondary storage is permanent
• Secondary storage is usually cheaper and large
• Secondary storage is bigger in capacity
• Secondary storage connects to the CPU
  via cables and therefore is slower
• Examples of secondary storage; Hard drive, CD-ROM...

Q8. What are enterprise storage systems?

An enterprise storage system is an independent, external system that includes two or more storage devices. It provides large amounts of storage, high-performance data transfer, a high degree of availability, protection against data loss, and sophisticate management tools.

Q9. Distinguish between human data input devices and source data automation.

Human data entry devices require a certain amount of human effort to input data. For example, keyboard, mouse, pointing stick, trackball, joystick, touch screen, stylus and voice-recognition.



Source data automation devices input data with minimal human intervention. Examples of source data automation include automated teller machine, magnetic stripe reader, point-of-sale terminals, barcode scanners, optimal mark reader and many more.

Q10.What is one new technology that will change how we do things? You need to do some research

The internet is one of the biggest technologies that is currently affecting people's everyday lives. It has allowed connection via Online Services, connecting via Other Means like cell phones and pagers. It has even allowed Internet Banking, which is now used by most people as a faster way of checking their bank deatils and transfer money without getting into the trouble of using transport to drive to the bank in order to fulfil tasks. It has been growing faster and faster.

Chapter 2: Competitive Advantage and Strategic Information Systems

Q1. What is the difference between an 'application' and a computer-based information system?

A computer based information system is an information system that uses computer technology to perform some or all of its intended tasks. An application program designed to support a specific task or business process.

Q2. What are strategic information systems?

Systems that help an organization gain a competitive advantage by supporting its strategic goals and/or increasing performance and productivity.

Q3. According to Porter, what are the five forces that could endanger a firm’s position in its industry or marketplaces?

1. The threat of entry to new competitors: the threat of new competitor entry is high when it is easy to enter your market and low when significant barriers to entry exist.
2. The bargaining power of suppliers: Suppliers’ power is high when buyers have few choices from whom to buy and low when buyers have many choices.
3. The bargaining power of customers (buyers): buyer power is high when buyers have many choices from whom to buy and low when buyers have few choices.
4. The threat of substitute products or services: is there are many substitutes for an organizations’ products or services, then the threat of substitutes is high.
5. The rivalry among existing firms in the industry: the threat from rivalry is high when there is intense competition among many firms in an industry. And low when the competition is among fewer firms and is not as intense.

Q4. In relation to Porter's value chain model, what is meant by primary activities and support activities, and how does IT support these activities?

Primary activities are those business activities related to the production and distribution of the firm’s products and services, thus creating value. Support activities are business activities that do not add value directly to a firm’s product or service under consideration but support the primary activities that do add value. IT supports these activities by assisting them in things like E-commerce or E-business in order to achieve and sustain a competitive advantage.

Q5. Discuss the logic of building information systems in accordance with the organizational hierarchical structure.

Q6. How has the Internet affected each of the five forces in Porter’s competitive forces model.

1. Cost leadership strategy: research different prices at a faster pace in order to produce products and/or services at the lowest cost in the industry.
2. Differentiation strategy: offer different products, services, and enables the business to develop different product features.
3. Innovation strategy: internet helps introduce new products and services, add new features to existing products and services, or develop new ways to produce them.
4. Operational effectiveness strategy: improvements in the internet increase quality, productivity, and employee and customer satisfaction.
5. Customer-orientation strategy: web-based systems can provide a personalized, one-to-one relationship with each customer.

Chapter 1: The Modern Organisation in the Global, Web-Based Environment

Q1. What are the characteristics of the modern business environment?

The characteristics of the modern business environment consist of a combination which includes the social, legal, economic, physical and political factors.

Q2. What is meant by a web-based, global platform, what does it provide, and how has it affected business?

A web-based, global platform is the use of internet worldwide which is known as “World Wide Web”. It enables individuals to connect, compute, communicate, collaborate and compare everywhere and anywhere and at anytime. It also allows access to unlimited amounts of information, services and entertainment, to exchange knowledge and to produce and sell goods and services. Global we-based platform has created globalization and is spreading day by day.

Q3. What are the main pressures that characterize the modern global business environment?

The main pressures that characterize the modern global business environment include:
§ Market pressure which are generated by the global economy and strong competition, the changing nature of the workforce, and powerful customers.
§ Technology pressures which mainly include technological innovation and information overload.
§ Societal/political/legal pressures which are the social responsibility, government regulation/deregulation, spending for social programs, spending to protect against terrorism, and ethics.

Q4. What are/discuss some of the common, IT oriented organizational responses to these pressures?

§ Customer focus: organizational attempts to provide superb customer service can make the difference between attracting and keeping customers on the one hand and losing them to competitors on the other. For example, Amazon.
§ E-business and E-commerce: doing business, like trading, electronically and is now considered an essential strategy for companies competing in today’s business environment. For example, E-bay.

Q5. How are IT architecture and IT infrastructure interrelated?

IT architecture is a high level map or plan of the information assets in an organization. IT infrastructure consist of the physical facilities, IT components, IT services, and IT personnel that support the entire organization. They are interrelated because one can’t progress or function without the other.

Q6. Is the Internet an infrastructure, architecture, or an application program? or something else. Why?

The internet is an architecture which consists of a high level of information assets which is combined with an infrastructure of tools and a whole range of application forms to function as an internet service.