E-Commerce in da house

Review on a post on Legal from E-Commerce blog.

2008-07-06T20:38:00.012+08:00

Article from e-commerze.blogspot.com

Another SMS scam

After the recent SMS scam attack on Digi subscribers, now is the turn for Maxis subscribers to experience the similar SMS scam.

Subscribers will be informed through SMSes that they had won some cash worth a few thousands from Maxis. In order to withdraw the money, they were required to call a foreign 15 digits phone number to provide then with the bank account number.

A Maxis spokeperson beside denying their involvement, also reminded the subscribers to ignore SMSes with foreign or weird codes.

Source: TheStar, 14th July 2007.

Personal Opinion:
Seems like the SMS scams is getting bolder and innovative. A lot of new tricks are being implemented to trick the subcribers to disclose some crucial financial and personal information. How could the government and telcos help to stop this scam from spreading on? May be they can consider the actions taken by SC in closing down the illegal fund investment websites - blocking all the weird or foreign codes? The government also should control the licenses for mobile services operators which are related to SMS.

Source: http://ecommerze.blogspot.com/search/label/Legal

Comments:

The SMSs scam has been in circulation in the past. They have misled many mobile subscribers, not just Digi, but now is the turn for Maxis/Hotlink customers. Maxis takes the issue of Spam and Hoax SMS very seriously. But why the public still get tricked after all these examples have been happen and even publish in the newspaper to the public. Furthermore, Maxis themselves have also advice the public to ignore it such message in ‘The Star’ (14 July, 2007). The most probably reason is because the cupidity of human. Seems the prizes for them are so attractive, they might go and try to see whether they are really such a ‘lucky star’ and finally get tricked. When receiving such SMSs, please be sane. Straight away think yourself on few questions:

Why does the number seem like an overseas number?

Did I join any competition?

Why doesn’t it address me by name?

Why do I have to call them? They should call me right?

Why mix up English with BM? Does not seem professional.

If you just feel that the SMS is not right, just ignore and delete the message. The public must wise up to such offerings.

Corporate Blogging: A new marketing communication tool for companies

2008-07-03T08:39:00.007+08:00

Blogging is experiencing explosive growth, starting with a few hundred in the year 2001 and reaching over 28 million in early year 2006. Each day, 1.5 million new entries are added to the internet.

Corporate blogging is an online phenomena providing the opportunity for employees at a levels of an organization to communicate with each other and to form communities around products, projects, and similar interests.

Corporate blogging also provide global access, they allow for a collaboration between company and clients, and provide integration with other traditional communication tools.

With corporate blogs, companies will be able to reach new audiences, and build stronger relationships with existing customers. It also allow new ways for companies to market new products and strategies and connect on a deeper level with their audiences.

There are many different types of corporate blogs, most can be categorized as either external or internal.

Internal blogs exists behind the firewall. It is accessible only from within the company’s network, which is a weblog that any employee can view. Internal blog encourage employee participation, free discussion of issues, collective intelligence and direct communication between employees and managers.

External blogs are made available on internet for the world to read. These are intended for marketing and developing a community based around the company products or brand. It offers a forum for company to communicate with the public.

Examples of the corporate blogs implementation and its effect:

Sun Microsystems, Inc.
Sun has been successful blogging both internally and externally. Their internal blog acts as an information management tool for researchers and developers.

Sun’s external blog is a forum for Chief Operations Officer Jonathan Schwartz to discuss his views on the technology industry. The blog is updated every few days and includes Mr. Schwartz’s opinion on industry happenings, Sun’s ideas and other news.

This blog is famous for giving a personal look into the mind and job of an executive at a major corporation.

http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/

Macromedia
The Macromedia blogs are an example of how to utilize blogs beyond marketing. Developers at Macromedia use an external blog with comments to keep in touch with end users. Through their blogs, these developers disseminate information about new features in their products and how to best take advantage of included features.

They also receive feedback on current and future initiatives. This helps them quickly respond to bugs users may find and allows them to develop the product features their users want and need.

Macromedia blogs also allow the developers to discuss their daily thoughts and activities. This gives users a window into the company, and fosters trust and friendship between the company and its customers.

http://weblogs.macromedia.com/

Pros and cons of corporate blogs
Advantages of corporate blogging
Following are some beneficial points of corporate blogging:
1. Managers can communicate directly with customers, suppliers and investors,
as well as employees, helping disseminate and explain strategy.

2. Compared with conference or printed memos to all staff, corporate blogs
are highly cost effective.

3. Corporate blogs give the company managers an opportunity to answer critics
in a controlled forum.

4. Corporate blogs are ideal for internal collaboration being a workspace where
project members can keep each other updated without wasting time writing
reports or searching the outlook inbox.

5. Sharing ideas freely in an honest voice brings the corporate blogging a new
connections and generate trust which will lead to more business
opportunities.

6. People are far more likely to give great feedback if they know someone
specific is listening. The power of these feedback loops can generate big
benefits to the company.

Disadvantages of corporate blogging
Following are some drawbacks of corporate blogging:
1. Corporate blogs can be tricky to drag public comment out of a company
without first routing through the sanitizing filter of a press office.

2. There is a risk that an ill-judged comment in corporate blogs could be
seized upon by the media or disgruntled investors.

3. Manage corporate blogs poorly can damage the reputation of the company.
such as blogs are not updated.

4. Poorly written corporate blogs can look fake and confuse the reader.

5. Corporate blogs make many companies look like disorganizations, with
multiple tones and opinions.

Things to take note to prevent e-auction fraud when a consumer participating in an e-auction

2008-07-02T22:57:00.005+08:00

Auction is a market mechanism where buyers make bids and sellers place offers to sell the products. The auctions will be held as the products are either valuable or when the prices of goods cannot be easily determined.

Whereas e-auction is auction conducts online where sellers use Internet-based software to bid against each other online and in real time against a published specification.

As the auction items are very unique, antique or used in many cases. The buyers may not look through or check the items that may be defective. However, sellers or buyers may conduct fraud. Some examples of fraud include bid shielding, shilling, fake photos and misleading descriptions, selling reproductions and so on.

There following are some preventions for the auctioneer to take notes to antifraud:
1. Authentication service.
Some products may be defective or may be fake thus the authenticators are able to determine whether the item is genuine and described appropriately.

2. Grading service.
The use of grading is to identify the physical condition of an item, such as “bad quality” or “mint condition”. It can differentiate the items that being graded. Different items have different grading systems.

3. Verification.
With verification, neutral third parties will identify and evaluate the condition of an item through various methods. For instance, some collectors own their item “DNA tagged” for identification purposes and provide a way of tracking an item.

4. Feedback forum.
The buyers and sellers are allowed to build up their online trading reputations. The users are able to comment on their experience with other people.

5. Insurance policy.
For instance, eBay, the Internet auctioneer offers insurance underwritten by Lloyd’s of London. The program provided with no cost to the eBay users.

6. Nonpayment punishment.
In order to protect the sellers, a friendly warning is given for the buyers who do not honor their winning bids. For a second-time offense, a sterner warning is issued. Warning will be given continuously until an indefinite suspension level reached.

7. Appraisal services.
These services include assessing the authenticity and condition and reviewing what comparable items have sold for in the marketplace.

8. User identity verification.
For instance, eBay uses the services of Equifax to verify user identities. This program encourages the users to supply eBay with information such as IC number, driver’s licence number, date of birth and so on for online verification.

Review a local e-commerce website

2008-07-02T21:58:00.019+08:00

There are many local e-commerce website in Malaysia, i had chosen one lucky website which is http://www.matchmaker.com.my/. This website is to help to look for love /selling love by online, i am know that this is not a new thing in nowadays, but it is quite funny and it raise up a question onmy mind: Can we find our true love through internet?

Definitely, this kind of website would not be in very formal styles, it is vey comfortable and using white and red colour as for their background which meant LovE and PeacE. Beside that, we can see or view lots of the female and male pictures in the front page of the website.

The user can sign up as member for 100% free membership, once the free trial expires, the member may purchase subscription , it categorized into Six months subscription. RM60 or US$16.00 or Twelve months subscription. RM100 or US$27.00 and the prices will never go up. and it is low priced dating website, so there would not have the manpower to handle refunds, and would not offer refunds.

The payment could be made by Credit Card, Cheque, or Direct Bank-in for Malaysia only. the credit card that accepted are American Express, Diner's Club , Discover , JCB , Master Card and Visa.

This website is just available for the existence member but not for the visitor, which meant the visitor could not simply access to the content of the website, so it is quite high confidential and the privacy of the member can be protected.

But it is not user-friendly because i just able to view their FAQ and it does not provide any information about their services and background.

Related to www.matchmaker.com.my

E-government in Malaysia: Its implementation so far and citizen's adoption strategies.

2008-07-02T21:10:00.022+08:00

E-government is started since the initiation of Multimedia Super Corridor (MSC) by Malaysia Government in 1996. It use information technology and e-commerce to provide citizens and organizations with more convenient access to government information and services and to provide delivery of public services to citizens, business partners, and those working in the public sector.

E-Government services focus on four main customers which are citizens, the business community, government employees and agencies. In E-government system, individuals are able to initiate a request for a particular government service and then receive that government service through the Internet or some computerized mechanism.

Malaysia government website (www.gov.my ) allow user to download various kind of form for any government department application, quick link such as government news, jobs, complaint, weather, policy feedback and many others, resource centre and polling center. This website has dual language such as Bahasa Malaysia and English, so user can choose for the language. There are 4 types of E-government services which are Government-to-Citizen (G2C), Government-to-Business (G2B), Government-to-Employee (G2E), and Government-to-Government (G2G).

Internal Revenue Department (IRD), online Tax using Mykey digital signature for companies to sign their C form and submit theirs document electronically to IRD. Mykey is a digital signature embedded into individual’s Mykad. It identifies and authenticates Mykad holders over internet, providing the capability to sign a document.

There is an increment of citizen using E-government in Malaysia as compare to past, which meant citizen willing to adopt this services. Why citizen willing to adopt E-Government in
nowadays?

This is because E-government is a way for public administration to become more open and transparent, and to reinforce democratic participation, more service-oriented, providing personalized and inclusive services to each citizen. E-Services form an emerging field, which is rapidly gaining attention and importance. Citizens are who expect and demand governmental services with a high degree of quality, quantity, and availability in a 24-hour, seven-days-a-week, and year-round fashion. Malaysia Governments are developing information systems and electronic services that have the capacity to meet these emerging service needs and demands of citizens and other clients.

Implementation of E-government involved cooperation between government, private sector, and others. The transparency of the skill between 2 sectors enables new product development through high leven creativity and innovation.

Beside that, E-government project is not mere computerization of government. It involved the efforts of the processor, standard and technologies, ICT need to incorporate into a package of modernization, changes and reform that challenge public administration current internal governance framework.

There is some issue like privacy and security is not easy to overcome, as it requires the collaboration of legal, technical, and social prevention and control mechanisms. Furthermore, it is the most concerned by citizens and social groups in general and on government websites specifically. As many of them are concerned about the availability of their personal data such as driving records, property and deed records, on the internet, even if the information is from the public records or the release is for the consideration of public safety and health.

Furthermore, internet security breakdown has become common for many public organizations. Along with the technology development, hackers are able to get into the system and change data and records to seek self interests or to create public crises. Anyway, the privacy issue will continue to be one of the major policy concerns in the future E-government development.

However, Malaysia is keep on improving the core government applications and integrating more services across agencies in order to solve the issues or problem faced by E-government and provide a better services to the citizens in future.

Refer to :
http://www.apdip.net/publications/iespprimers/eprimer-egov.pdf

http://www.intanbk.intan.my/psimr/articles/Article1%20-%20Full.pdf

http://www.pps.fsksm.utm.my/pars2007/pars/pars/before%20correct/information%20system%20management/26)salaheddin.pdf

The application of pre-paid cash card for consumers

2008-06-28T19:28:00.003+08:00

In the recent years, the “Prepaid Debit Cards” came into existence and popularity. The biggest distinction with “Prepaid Debit Cards” is that no checks are associated with Prepaid Debit Card accounts. Prepaid Debit Cards are much safer for the banks to issue because:
· All transactions for these new debit cards are authorized online against account balances
· There are no “Floats” from written checks that can cause overdrafts

These new debit cards are applicable to just about anybody with a valid government issued ID and verifiable address.

Besides, prepaid Debit Cards can be issued to “Bankable People” and “Un-Banked People” with:
· No bank account needed
· No banking history needed
· No credit check
· Just about everyone is approved - no declines
· No employment verification needed

The advantages of holding a Debit Card for a consumer are as follow:
1. Easy Payment
Debit Card is the simplest and most convenient way of making payment of goods and/or services purchased.

2. Convenience
The major advantage is that you need not require carrying bulky cash, as the small plastic is convenient to place in your wallet.

3. Replacement
In case your card is lost/stolen, you can immediately block the usage by informing the bank and get a replacement one.

4. Emergency Use
It is useful during emergency situations like shortage of cash, late night etc

5. Easy For Travelers
You can benefit from our International card if you are frequent traveler as it prevents hassles of foreign exchange.

Review on a post on e-tailing from my E-commerce blog

2008-06-28T05:17:00.045+08:00

I feel that, Touch n Go(T'n'G) is a great invention, help to reduce many problems: long queue for purchasing ticket for KTM, LRT and Monorail, queue up for Toll, theme park and a few of name. It helps those users by saving lots of time for queuing up.

Now, with a new implemented by Touch n Go Company which is using Touch n Go card to buy fast food in Malaysia. It can reduce the cycle time which that make the purchase transaction faster and no need to carry a big lump sum of cash when going out.

As compare to past time, T'n'G card is expensive and only a certain location do sell it, but nowadays, you can get it from any mobile phone shop beside of its kiosk. Therefore, even for a kids or teenagers also able to afford for this card.

Anyway, nothing is perfect, although it provides lots of the benefits to the user but we still can see a “long long……” queue when we pass by the Toll. Why this will happen? It's due to an inconvenience for top up for Touch n Go card.

Not every Toll provides this service to the user. In addition that, Malaysian attitude is most likely based on last minute job, they seldom bother about their balances in the card, therefore it always happen of those embracing situation like reverse their car from the Touch n Go lane. So, if the T'n'G want to expand their service to buy fast food in Malaysia, it need to consider of the issue as I mentioned as above.
Beside that, the function of the T'n'G as same as a wallet and even can keep more moneys than wallet, so it is more attractive to be stolen by the thief , as it does not need any signature or verification, compare to credit card. So, the company could implement a signature or verification of the card in order to prevent any imitation or fraud happened.

Other incident happened like system error such as made an extra charge to the card user, a sudden breakdown of the machine, intend of the staff to defalcate and others. Thus, the T'n'G company should consistently upgrade, supervise and maintain their services.

According to the report, consist of 50% of user which is actively using the T’n’G card for retail usage as compare with the Octopus card , the transit electronic purse in Hong Kong that is one of the most successful in the world, that only 20% of the holders use it for retail purchase.
So Malaysia should provide more reload center for the users and also keep on upgrading their services.

Related to article:
Using Touch n Go card to buy fast food in Malaysia will be a reality

Credit Card Debts: Causes and Preventions

2008-06-26T23:12:00.023+08:00

Nowadays it seems that credit cards are almost a necessity, which has caused many people to have a huge problem with credit card debt. Many people now have more than one credit card with a balance and you may even be one of those people. If you are one of the millions of people wanting to get out of credit card debt, then you first need to understand what caused the credit card debt problem to begin with.

A credit card is a card with which you are able to use by borrowing on credit. Every time you use a credit card, you are borrowing money from the credit card issuer. Also, each time you use your credit card, you are increasing your credit card debt. And excessive credit card debt can cause a poor credit rating, bankruptcy and subjection to high annual interest rates.

However, if spending habits are not controlled, which causes credit card debt to increase even faster. What started off as a small credit card debt rapidly becomes a large amount that can seem impossible to pay off.

Now that the credit card debt problem has been explained in a very basic manner, we need the solution to get the problem under control.

1. Limit the number of cards that you have. If your cards offer low interest balance transfers, transfer the balances from your other cards onto the card with the lowest rate.

2. Pay off the entire outstanding balance each month. If you must carry a balance from time to time, pay off most of the balance each month. Stop using the credit card until you pay the entire balance off. Pay on Time, otherwise, you will get charged extra fees.

3. Try to pay off the balance during the interest free period. If your credit card offers an interest free promotional period, make the most out of it by paying off any debt that you have accumulated by the end of the period.

4. Never use a credit card for cash advances. Cash advances are subject to high fees and interest rates.

5. Create a budget by make each credit card purchase only within the framework of your budget. If you can't stick to your budget, then don't carry your credit card with you.

6. Keep all credit card receipts, and reconcile them with your statement each month. Review the statement as soon as you get it. Make sure your monthly purchases fit within your budget.

Last of all, one simple phrase can sum up the solution to your credit card debt problems is If you don't have the money to spend, then don't spend it!!

Electronic currency

2008-06-26T15:32:00.011+08:00

Electronic currency is also known as electronic cash, e-money, electronic money, digital money, digital cash or digital currency. It refers to a system that allows an individual to pay for goods or services by transmitting a number from one computer to another. So an electronic currency is simply a unit of exchange by using the Internet.

As almost every individual knows of E-commerce, and, there is a consumer to spend money online therefore electronic payment systems are construed. Up to now, there are many countries offering the ways of transferring money by using Internet. One of the successful cases is occurred in Singapore. It had implemented the electronic money for its public transportation system such as commuter, buses, etc.

E-money requires no complicated software and it allows the transfer of electronic cash to anyone through an e-mail address. Some of the banking business industries which are in biggest names are involved in using e-money. These include Bank One and Well Fargo. Of course there are also some of the small companies using e-money system. E-money is actually designed for the exchange of funds between the individuals. Moreover, some of the e-money providers allow commercial activities for a small fee towards college students, children or making small monetary gifts. The e-money technology can also be used to pay someone, or collect funds from someone who needs to pay you. The payments you made are using your credit card or with your offline bank account.

The electronic currency system will lead to some limitations as well. A major disadvantage to electronic currency is fraud. If a customer has lost or misplaced his private key, a perpetrator would use it to withdraw funds. As a result, that customer would have to bear the payments because the bank did not know about the case. Besides, the hacker will know about the recipient of the message of the owner if the security code is broken and the message is intercepted, the hacker will have intention on stealing away the recipient of the message.

Besides, another major concern is that counterfeiters could create their own personal coins of e-cash as it is just a piece of money that is very easy to duplicate. Therefore, it is difficult to distinguish from real money and impossible to detect. Additionally, only the consumers with PCs are able to use it, while those without would not use it. E-cash may be less secure than bank money. The money which stored on a PC will be lost if the system crashes. For instance, money stored on an electronic wallet could be lost forever should the card is damaged.

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

2008-06-25T22:32:00.007+08:00

There is a tremendous potential for mobile telecommunication networks to become an important electronic payment channel in our country considering that 88 percent of the Malaysian population are subscribing to mobile phone services.

According to Bank Negara Malaysia Governor Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz, the high penetration rate affirmed mobile phone networks as an increasingly popular channel for Malaysians to perform a plethora of activities beyond voice communication, encompassing all forms of digital communication, commerce, banking and payments.

With 25 million mobile phone subscribers in Malaysia, Zeti said there were immense opportunities to leverage on mobile phones to accelerate the migration to electronic payments, to widen the reach and appeal of electronic payment services, and to deliver innovative mobile payment products that offer speed and convenience at minimal cost for the public.There are also opportunities to enable the provision of efficient and cost-effective method of delivering financial services even in the remote areas, she said.
Tan Sri Dr Zeti Akhtar Aziz pointed out that industry has to respond rapidly to address the need for interoperability and collaborate in areas such as developing a common infrastructure, common payment messaging format as well as common security and authentication standards, to promote the significant use of the mobile phone for financial services.A shared integrated network with common security standard and common messaging standards would make it easier, more cost-effective and more convenient for consumers, merchants and service providers to execute and receive payments, thereby increasing the attractiveness of the mobile network as a payment channel, she added.

Furthermore, mobile payment is safe, secure and convenient. It allows everyone to pay to anyone, at anytime from anywhere with just one SMS. It also allows one to receive money from anyone, from anywhere, at anytime. Mobile payments are including credit card bills, and your loan repayments from home.

And for merchants, business can be done anywhere such as conduct billing. There will be increased business opportunities for merchants as remote mobile payment can be done easily with the lower transaction and maintenance cost.

In Malaysia there are several companies that already launched mobile payment systems such as Redtone, Maxis, Digi, Maybank, Hong Leong Bank, Mobile Money International Sdn Bhd, and mobileExec Sdn Bhd.

The application of 3rd party certification

2008-06-20T22:50:00.007+08:00

iPhone OS is the operating system developed by Apple Inc. for the iPhone and iPod touch. Like Mac OS X, from which it was derived, it uses the Darwin foundation. iPhone OS has three abstraction layers: a Core Services layer, a Media layer, and a Cocoa Touch layer. The operating system takes less than half a gigabyte (GB) of the devices' total memory storage.At the 2007 Apple Worldwide Developers Conference Apple announced that the iPhone and iPod touch will support third-party "applications" via the Safari web browser, referred to as web applications. The applications can be created using web technologies such as AJAX. Many third party iPhone web applications are now available.

Currently, the iPhone and iPod touch cannot officially install full programs from anyone but Apple. However, many third party native applications are now available, despite this complete lack of support by Apple. Such native applications face the possibility of being broken by any iPhone OS update, though Apple has stated it will not design software updates specifically to break native applications (other than applications that perform SIM unlocking). These are available through the installer application, which is installed on the iPhone after major methods of jailbreaking. Some well known members of the 3rd party app community have switched over to the official SDK.

Since iPhone OS has been closed down the device from UMD (or UMPC), I can conclude that the Apple iPhone is not just a smartphone. It is a very high-end feature phone. As feature phones have increased functionality, input mechanisms, and outputs (displays and speakers), some feature phones have been very smartphone-like.

How to safeguard your personal and financial data?

2008-06-20T21:59:00.014+08:00

Online security can be treated as a “necessity” for those who own a computer. Now I am going to share with you about the safeguards on your data.

The simplest method to protect your data from stealing your information by the hackers or crackers is to install anti-virus software and must keep updating it daily. The significant threats to computer-based information consist of viruses and trojans, spyware or adware, and computer failures. If you do not own the anti-virus software, you are ruining your computer’s life. The newer programs, for instance, Norton Anti-Virus will download updates automatically. Eventhough you have anti-virus software, you also required to update it and get the edition that enables automatic updates and scans those incoming mails or items in your computer if you use the old version anti-virus software.

Besides, you can also set up the firewall for your computer. If you do not set up a firewall, it is vulnerable to those hackers. The firewall can be used to filter the inherently dangerous services and to expose the protected network to fewer risks. For instance, a firewall could block the dangerous services such as Network File System from entering the protected subnet.

Additionally, you must back up your file or data daily. Without data back up, you will be running the risk of losing your data. Mostly you save your important assets of your business or your family data in the computer. You can back up your data in CD-RW, tape, drives or even portable hard drives. If any incident such as theft, fire, flood etc happens, you will still be protected as your data has been safeguarded.

Furthermore, if you share information with another user by using a public computer such as in a library, school computer lab or Internet café, you have to remember to close the window browser. This is to prevent other users to read your personal information and mail. Avoid from using passwords that are easy for someone to guess. Your passwords you created must be strong and keep them well protected, so that the malicious users could not steal you information.

Likewise, keep an eye on anyone who seems interested in your transactions when you using an ATM. When inserting your PIN number, you should use your free hand to shield the keypad to prevent others to peep it. Bankers can also add on fingerprint scanning on ATM machine.

I strongly advice everyone to cooperate with each other to prevent the disclosure of our own or consumer personal and financial data. Hope that everyone can concern about computer security by viewing my post to follow the steps of safeguards on data.

Reference:

1. http://www.aroundhawaii.com/lifestyle/computers/2004-05_take_a_few_steps_to_safeguard_your_pc_and_data.html

The threats of online security: How safe is your data?

2008-06-19T23:24:00.012+08:00

Nowadays, Internet attacks are increasing in number and complexity. When Internet users browse any websites which contain the damaging threats, the regarding threats would attack or destroy their computers. The damaging threats such as viruses, spyware, adware, scumware, hacker attacks, identity theft and fraud are common occurrence.

Trojan horse refers to one of the most serious threats to the computer security. A Trojan horse is a program in which malicious or harmful code is contained inside harmless programming that it can ruin the file allocation table on the hard disk or even stop the computer’s normal functions. Furthermore, Trojan horse not only attacks your computer once you trapped by it, but may also attack other people’s computer unknowingly. Therefore, everyone must be aware of this type of virus because Trojan horse can be spread to hurt other people easily when you are infected.

Besides, spyware is another virus that attack user’s computer. A large number of problems that have arisen are such as pop-up ads that multiply uncontrollably, system slowdowns of freezes and mysteriously redirect us to the websites we have never heard of. Adware is similar to spyware, which is software that installed on the computer to show advertisements. Adware can also slow down user’s pc and even increase the instability of user’s system because many adware applications are not well-programmed.

Internet fraud has a broad meaning in covering Internet transaction that involves falsified information. The common Internet fraud are such as fake IDs, diplomas, and recommendation letters sold as credentials and others. Some Internet fraud schemes also involve identity theft-wrongful obtaining and using of someone’s personal data in some way that involves fraud or deception, typically for economic gain. For example, in 2001, the entire municipality of Largo, Florida lost their emails for more than a week because an unknown company has compromised its identity. Then the company hacked into the city’s email relay system to steal the identity of the Largo.com. Because of the e-mail spam from Largo.com addresses the net, all incoming and outgoing messages were blacklisted from the city.

Another internet fraud is done through the use of stolen credit card information.

The crackers who probably are the companies’ employees can easily obtain the huge quantities of credit card information from the companies’ databases. They deal with the companies’ customers in selling those credit cards information to them. This has led to criminal cases occurrence. Besides, the use of credit cards for making online purchase or payment can be unsecured. The so-called secure transactions are actually not fully secure since the information need to be decoded into plain text to process it.

Therefore, we have to safeguard our data carefully and properly. If we don’t do so, the more and more online threats will be continuously occurred in our life.

References:
1. http://www.bsagovernment.com/downloads/MajorOnlineThreats.pdf
2. http://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid14_gci213221,00.html

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

2008-06-19T23:05:00.033+08:00

After viewing the blog, I feel so curious to know more about mobile Malware. It has a rapidly growth of mobile Malware recently, the primary reasons which are as below:
· The price of phone continues to drop and vendor involved in production.

· Virus writer is allowed to gain a deep understanding of the operating system.

· Mobile phone users tend to save a great deal of private data into their devices, so there is a potential financial gain from identity theft or misappropriation of credit card information.

· Windows Mobile and Win32 are very similar, so it is easy for Win32 malware author to transition to mobile malware.

There are many ways to prevent of mobile Malware except of those in the article.
· The best way to prevent mobile from Malware attacks is to install anti-virus and anti-Malware tools. Such as, a combination of both PC-based anti-virus software and mobile anti-virus software, it is the most effective solution to prevent infection than products that only detect or clean viruses.

· Off the WI-FI and Bluetooth when in outdoors, because these function are easier to exploit for sending malicious code or viruses.

· Make a frequent back up of data stored on mobile services, as contact lists are vitally important, then if the mobile device had been infected, so we can recover the default setting to clean the system.

· Don’t save the business data or any confidential files or photo in mobile device as possible. This is a profit motive to drive those Malware writers to create mobile viruses.

· If the phone is auto-connected to General Packet Radio Service(GPRS), it might be infected with a virus that send data to others. If discover this problem, disconnect the device immediately and install anti- virus software to remove Malware.

related to article :

http://ecommerze.blogspot.com/search/label/internet%20security http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/white_papers/threat_center/wp_malware7a_en.pdf

Phishing: Examples and its prevention methods.

2008-06-19T02:51:00.013+08:00

Phishing is the new 21st century crime. It is the practice of sending out fake emails, or spam, written to appear as if they have been sent by banks or others organisations, with the intent of luring the recipient into revealing sensitive information such as usernames, passwords, account number, ATM pins or credit card details.

Examples:

Charlotte's Bank of America example

PayPal example

eBay example

Tagged.com example

Prevention methods

Following are some good practices to follow in order to avoid being a victim of phishing.
1. Always be wary of any email requesting personal information. Don't reply to
any suspicious looking emails or click on any links that you are not sure. You
can never be too cautious.

2. Always ensure that you are on a secure connection to a web server when
submitting personal information across the internet. Seeing an https://
appear in the URL instead of http:// and also seeing a picture of a locked
padlock in the lower right-hand corner of the browser window, not the
page itself.

3. Do not use your personal email address on online forms or any public forum
such as such as newsgroups and mailing lists. Doing so may cause you be
flooded with spam.

4. Avoid emails with urgent requests for financial, account, or email
information. Such as emails that ask for usernames and passwords, credit
card numbers, or other personal information.

5. Use antivirus and firewall software and keep them up to date using their
update features. Anti-virus software can detect and delete virus files
before they can attack a computer and firewall can protect computer from
being hacked into. Software can be use are such as AVG Antivirus, Avast
Home Edition, Sygate Personal firewall and Kerio Personal firewall.

6. Install Spyware removal software such as AdAware. Spyware are files that
can be installed on your computer, even if you don't want them, without your
knowing. They allow companies to monitor your internet browsing patterns.

7. Never buy anything from a company that sends you spam. Don't even visit
their sites or ask for more information.

8. Make sure to carefully review your bank statements to check for
unauthorized transactions. Many credit card companies have identity
protection features that will reimburse you for charges made by an
attacker, so long as they are promptly identified.

How E-Commerce can reduce cycle time, improve employees' empowerment and facilitate customer support.

2008-06-13T23:13:00.010+08:00

E-commerce is the process of buying, selling, or exchanging products, services, or information via computer networks. It can perform faster and efficiency to the traders by reducing cycle time, improve employees’ empowerment and facilitate customer support.

Cycle time is the time required to complete a given process. For example, customer orders process which is included of many sub-process such as order entry, assembly, inspection, packaging, and shipping. By conducting E-commerce, it can eliminate or reduce non-value-added activity, which is defined as any activity that does not add value to the product like repair due to defects, machine set-up, inspection, testing and schedule delays, so it can lower the cost and the product can be deliver on time or even faster. Dell Co. is a successful example which use E-procurement for improve purchasing of components, collaborative commerce with its supplier and others.

Employee is the human capital for the organization even through in E-commerce. Empowerment of employees meant that giving the authority to the employees to make decision regarding all the aspect of E-business. An intranet is created in order to allow the employees to access the internal corporate or government network and update and provide guidance about the company’s activity or its products and services, and respond to customers' product information requests and handle the complaints. Ford motor Co. had just been awarded ‘Best internal corporate website ever’ in year 2001. Its intranet support over 175,000 users across 92 countries, which also allow employee to customize their site and view to get information and tools they need for their job.

Customers are the very livelihood of business organizations. So, customer satisfaction is as a necessary condition for the success of organizations. Therefore, various types of E-commerce solutions are accommodated to the retailer as to facilitate the customer support. Then, customers can easily to get the information about the product and service, asking question (FAQ), and select the available given product, collaborate with the company better and others.

E-commerce could create competitive advantages; reduce cost/ cost leadershipand widening strategic network amongtraders for the company.

The failure of an e-commerce example and its causes

2008-06-13T07:24:00.011+08:00

eToys Inc. was founded by Edward C. Lenk, known as Toby. Lenk was born in Boston in 1961 and graduated with a degree in economics from Bowdoin College, Maine, in 1983. eToys Inc. is a leading on-line retailer of children's products. Its emphasis is toys, but it aims to sell parents a vast array of things that their children might want or need.

Being first to the market is always considered a business advantage, and investors began shoving money at Lenk. He collected over $15 million from the venture capital firm Sequoia and other venture capital firms, plus $250,000 in seed capital from a web business incubator called Idealab. He raised money from friends at Disney as well. eToys seemed to be in the position Amazon.com had been in when it became the first on-line bookstore. Lenk was sure that the giant mass-market toy retailer Toys `R' Us would soon start its own web site, and he rushed to get eToys going before that happened. In March 1997, eToys went on line.

By September 1999 eToys had announced that it had 80,000 children's book titles available for sale through its site. It hyped its new bookstore by arranging on-line interviews with notable children's authors, and it made sample pages of some 400 books available for on-line browsing. Then it teamed up with television talk show hostess Rosie O'Donnell. O'Donnell began a 'Rosie's Readers' children's book club on her show, and eToys tied in with her with a special 'Rosie's Readers' portion of its web site. Part of the proceeds of eToys' Rosie's Readers sales went to O'Donnell's charitable foundation.

To prepare for the Christmas season, eToys began running advertising on television and in parenting magazines. There is alsoa campaign with a tag line ran, 'Where will you find the perfect gift for your child? EToys. Where great ideas come to you.' The campaign cost eToys $20 million, which represented a significant portion of the company's total revenues. The soft tone of the advertising sought to convey a new, broader image of the company. eToys was not just another place to shop for toys, but a parent's ally in finding the best for a child.

Also to prepare for Christmas, eToys outsourced some of its order fulfillment to Fingerhut.

However, like many of its failed brethren, the spending of millions on advertising, marketing, and technology and battled a host of competitors was outweighed the company's income, and investors quickly jumped ship.

eToys closed in March 2001, but after being owned for a period by KayBee Toys, it's now back for a second run.

The successful story of Amazon.com

2008-06-13T04:52:00.017+08:00

E-commerce, also known as electronic commerce, where by utilizing the Internet, has become a very powerful tool in modern business trading.

One of the very successful e-commerce examples is Amazon, which is an American electronic commerce company in Seattle, Washington. Amazon is the largest bookstore in the world. According to the industry experts, Amazon is well positioned to maintain a firm grip on its title as the undisputed e-commerce leader.

The founder of Amazon, Jeffrey Bezos, had the mindset of creating an online bookstore because of his eager inspiration to search for the perfect Web business.

Why is Amazon so successful?

Jeffrey Bezos knew where to get the venture capital. He is a smart person that he got an early start on his strategy for Amazon and disbursed whatever it took to build up the business and its name. Jeff Bezos spent heavily on advertising to establish his new venture. Amazon has banners to appear on at least 28,000 other sites on the Internet to attract those customers to just order books using a computer instead of actually going to a bookstore. For instance, if a person is browsing on a search engine for a particular subject, when the search brings up a menu of selections, it will also bring up the Amazon banner that says, “for books about (whatever) go to amazon.com.” Thus, as expected, the business took off more quickly than anyone had predicted.

Furthermore, open source is also another main player of the successful Amazon story. Linux on commodity hardware has permitted Amazon to reduce its costs since it launched. Besides, Amazon is laos a heavy user of Perl, MySQL, and Mason. At the same time, Amazon has also presented a key challenge to many parts of the open source story. The licenses compelled Amazon to not release its source as its software is never distributed although it has its own open source software.

Nevertheless, Amazon has created its own "architecture of participation," that is perhaps even richer than that of many open source software development communities. Amazon has built a lot of contributors that numbers in the millions. Everyone who rates books, creates Listmania Lists, or just buys the books and contributes to the sales-rank calculations, helps to build the Amazon interface. Even though Amazon has closed codes, another robust architecture for participating in the data layer of the interface has existed.

Amazon found out that there is an incongruity between its closed code and the benefits it received from the open source software, and that leads the leader rethink about how to redress the balance.

The history and evolution of E-commerce

2008-06-13T04:18:00.011+08:00

History of ecommerce dates back to the invention of the very old notion of “sell and buy”, electricity, cables, computers, modems, and the Internet. The commercial-oriented sharing of electronic data among computers become possible in the 1950s with the advent of geographically dispersed computers. However, in the early years of computers, data formats used to be highly specialized (closed). Subsequently the systems too were closed; in other words, the software applications of a certain producer were not able to communicate with the applications of another producer, which hindered the data exchange between the computers that were not running the same software application. None of these many systems ended up by being adopted as a standard for commercial applications.

The first extended use of a form of electronic commerce appeared in the early 1970s
when system called Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT) was introduced. This enabled
banks and financial institutions to transfer over secure networks large amounts of
money either among themselves or with associated businesses.

In the year of 1984s, EDI, or electronic data interchange, was standardized through ASC X12. This guaranteed that companies would be able to complete transactions with one another reliably.

A significant change for e-commerce occurred in 1991, when the United States
government allowed public access to the internet. CompuServe offers online retail products to its customers. This gives people the first chance to buy things off their computer.

Netscape arrived in the year of 1994. Providing users a simple browser to surf the Internet and a safe online transaction technology called Secure Sockets Layer.

E-Commerce is not just a term but a revolution for the online industry in the year of 1995. The two of biggest names in e-commerce are launched: Amazon.com and eBay.com.

DSL, or Digital Subscriber Line, arrive in the year of 1998, provides the fast, always-on Internet service to subscribers across California. This prompts people to spend more time, and money to online.
History of ecommerce is a history of a new, virtual world which is evolving according to the customer advantage. All the tasks, letters, messages and data transferred within a flick of a second at any place no matter how far or how near. This all was impossible even for a thought or a dream, for things to be like that just a few years ago. It is a world which we are all building together brick by brick, laying a secure foundation for the future generations.

Revenue model for Google, Amazon.com and EBay

2008-06-12T21:46:00.018+08:00

Revenue model is a description of how the organization will earn revenue, produce profits, and produce a superior return on invested capital. The major revenue models are:

Sales revenue model: A company gets the revenue by selling goods, information or services.

Transaction fee revenue model: A company receives a commission for enabling or executing a transaction. It is based on the volume of transactions made.

Advertising revenue model: A company provides a forum for advertisements and receives fees from the companies that advertise their products.

Subscription revenue model: A company charges a subscription fee for the users that access to the content and services offered.

Affiliate revenue model: A company receives commissions for referring customers to others web sites.

Google’s Revenue Model
A major percentage of Google yearly income is generated by the advertising revenue model. Google advertising revenue model includes Google AdWords, Google AdSense and Froogle.

Google AdWords is pay per click advertising program of Google designed to allow the advertisers to present advertisement to people are looking for information related to what the advertiser has to offer. Google generate most of the revenue from Google AdWords.

Google AdSense is an ad serving program. Website owners can enroll in this program to enable text, image and, video advertisements on their sites. These ads can generate revenue on either a per-click or per-thousand-impressions basis.

Froogle is a price engine website launched by Google Inc. It is a service from Google that makes it easy to find information about products for sale online.

Besides, Google is currently testing a new advertising program that pays site owners based on a Cost-Per-Click model, called Cost-Per-Action. It differ from AdSense ads in that a site owner gets paid whenever a visitor clicks on an ad and performs a specific action, such as purchasing a product from the advertiser.

Amazon.com Revenue Model
Next to Ebay, the best known name on the Web is Amazon. It was one of the first major companies to sell goods by Internet. Amazon generates revenue primarily by selling books, videos, electronics, and kitchen equipment on domestic and international Web sites, such as Amazon Marketplace.

Amazon Marketplace is Amazon.com’s fixed price online marketplace that allows sellers to offer their goods alongside Amazon’s offerings. Buyers can buy new and used items sold directly by a third party through Amazon.com using Amazon Marketplace. This sales strategy and program has been very profitable for Amazon.com. Amazon charges a commission rate based on the sale price, a transaction fee, and a variable closing fee. Which are sales revenue model and transaction fee revenue model.

Moreover, Amazon.com also generates revenue by Affiliate revenue model. Amazon was one of the first online businesses to set up an affiliate marketing program. AStore is an Amazon.com affiliate product which website owners can use to create an online store on their site. The store does not allow website owners to sell their own products directly. Website owners pick products from Amazon’s store and earn referral fees on the products purchased by their readers. The fee structure is currently the same as for the other affiliate links and ranges from 4% to 10% of the product price.

Ebay Revenue Model
Ebay is an online auction and shopping website in which people and businesses buy and sell goods and services worldwide. Millions of collectibles, appliances, computers, furniture, equipment, vehicles, and other miscellaneous items are listed, bought, and sold daily. EBay generates revenue from a number of fees such as insertion fees, promotional fees, and final value fees.

Insertion fees: When an item listed on Ebay, this nonrefundable fee is charged.

Promotional fees: Fees that charged for additional listing options that help attract attention for an item, such as highlighted or bold listings.

Final value fees: Commission that charged to the seller at the end of the auction.

Furthermore, Ebay generate revenue by sales revenue model through its subsidiary, Half.com, offers fixed price, person-to-person selling of goods, including books, CDs, videos and games, charging a 15% commission on completed sales.

Additionally, a portion of Ebay’s revenue also comes from direct advertising on the site, as well as end to end service providers whose services increase the speed of transactions. The acquisition of PayPal, whose products allow the exchange of money over the Internet, brings additional transaction based fee revenue.

M3..

2008-06-07T18:30:00.000+08:00

My name is Lee Tze Dung. I am from Penang, which known as "The Pearl of the Orient". There are seven members in my family, my parent, three sisters, a brother and myself.

I am an undergraduate student, studying at University Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR), major in Accounting. And now I am Year 3 Semester 1 student, from tutorial group 5.

I have been very active in sports. My favorite sports are badminton, basketball and ping pong. I often watch TV in evenings when I am not studying. I like to go shopping on weekends. And my favorite pastime is drinking.

The top five web sites that I like to visit most are Google, Yahoo, Wikipedia, Friendster, and E-newspaper.

Google and Yahoo are the most used search engine on the web. Both directories contain billions of Web pages, so that users can search for the information they want. I often use Google and Yahoo to search for information for my assignments. However, I also use Wikipedia to acquire knowledge and find the articles that I need.

Friendster is an internet social network service. I always use Friendster to communicate with my friends, share my profile and photos with them. Besides, I met a lot of friends from different countries through Friendster.

Moreover, I like to read online newspaper. From the online newspaper I can get to know the latest news from different countries easily. The E-newspaper I like are The Star, New Straits Times, BBC News and CNN.

I also like to chat with friends in MSN, check my emails and watch movie online during my free time.

About me

2008-06-07T11:11:00.000+08:00

My name is Cheam Cheau Erl. I was born on the 3rd Jan of 1987. That makes me 21 this year, and a Capricorn. I'm the second daughter in my family, also the most rebellious.

I am a full time student study at UTAR, S.Long. I am taking Accounting course that is the most popular course in business field. I think I like accounting, but the main reason I choose this course is because I heard some of the people said it can help me to find job more easily after I graduate.

My hometown is in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah. It's a small city located in East Malaysia, about 2 and half hour by plane from Kuala Lumpur. Sabah is really a hidden treasure of Malaysia with a lot of wonderful islands. Everything you see in travel brochures about Sabah is true; we really have a lot of trees and jungle over there, but, We Don’t Live in the Trees!

I am a shopaholic, like to shop a lot. I think this is my only hobby over my life in KL. The other entertainment for my study life is hanging out with friends to Green Box for singing. But singing is not really my hobby because I cannot sing well. I don’t like sports; especially those sport activities that make me perspire.

I cannot imagine how my life will be if it’s without my notebook. I love online, visiting the websites like yahoo and Google that help me a lot in my assignments. Besides, visiting friendster and hotmail has becoming my habit, its make me met a lot of friends from different countries. The other website that I like to visit is YouTube, there got a lot of funny stuffs and music videos that uploaded by others, it’s really fun!

My study life is not boring with my notebook. I can cheer up my day only with my notebook by chatting in MSN, watching movies, checking my e-mail, searching documents and listening to the music.

Finally, I like freedom; I am not trying to enjoy life more, but to avoid being pushed around by others. Maybe unwilling to obey or submit to directions for which I can see no reason, or with which I disagree.Yes.

This is just a simple me!

About myself

2008-06-06T23:00:00.006+08:00

Hello, here's my first blog entry, after pondered for a moment, I am deciding to do a simple intro about myself. My name is Teoh Kim Wah, female, 24 years old. I am come from Alor Star, capital of Kedah, and this is a place where place where our Former Prime Minister, Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, born and spent his growing days. Currently, I am taking an undergraduate accounting course in University Tunku Abdul Rahman（UTAR), Sungai Long. This is my final year studied in university, and very glad that to know a lots of nice friend during my university life.

I can be said as an optimistic by nature, extroverted and always wear a dazzling smile on my face person, I like to chat with other people, and telling jokes is one of my favorite things to do. My hobby is listening to music, I prefer those music that impassioned. Beside that, I also like to surf net, swimming and watching movie during my spare time. I wish to have a budget traveling around the world if I have more money; this is definitely being a more frequently indulged hobby.

As I mentioned above, I like to surf net, network is very common in use in nowadays. It is a great exploit! The top 5 websites that most visited by me are, firstly, www.friendster.com, through Friendster, I could know more new friends from other country beside of my old buck. And the same time I can post my pretty picture and share my sweet memory with all of my friends. Second, surfing in www.google.com is indispensable to me, because there are many assignments and research that I need to complete within my study life. Google and its scholar Google are assisting and providing lots of information and data during my research.

Thirdly, as a business student, so I need to have a well knowledge about the business industry and it is costly to subscribe The Edge daily as for a full time student, so I prefer to access to www.theedgedaily.com, as to read all these hot topics/ news in order to improve my knowledge related to business. The fourth website I accessed is www.wikipedia.com, this website is a free, open content, community-built encyclopedia with thousands of articles on topics from A to Z. I can learn many new things and post up my opinion too.

Lastly, my university intranet www.utar.edu.my, this provide me the latest issues or activities held in university, show my course syallabus, exam timetable ,informatin gateway and a few of names. Beside that, the activities are such as online shopping, playing online game, downloading free software or theme, chatting and also discussing assignment through Messenger (MSN) or Skypes with my lovely friends.

~Self-introduction session~

2008-06-06T20:05:00.000+08:00

Hello there! My name is Goh Li-Shyan, I’m turning 21 years old. I came from Seremban, Negeri Sembilan. I am an Accounting student in University Tunku Abdul Rahman, which is located at Bandar Sungai Long, Kajang.

I enjoy drawing very much. Whenever there is a beautiful scenery or object, I wish I could draw it and keep it as a memento. During my free time, I would like to watch Japanese anime or Hong Kong drama. My favorite Japanese anime is ‘Sailormoon’ as it has been accompanying me since I was in primary school. I hope I can have the full collection of ‘Sailormoon’. Moreover, I also love singing. I will go to Jaya Jusco Cheras Selatan to have ‘K session’ with my buddies whether I am feeling happy or moody.

The websites that I browse very often are Google and Yahoo as they are very useful in searching for any information related with my assignments or looking for any subject that one likes to comprehend more. Besides, I use Hotmail to check emails and most of the emails that I received bring a lot of health tips or other news to improve my general knowledge. I also log onto Friendster website to stay in touch with my friends and make new friends. Another website that I visit is the Cleocat Wholesale Fashion site. It is a Singapore-based online store for fashion clothing, dresses and bags.

The internet activities that are popular among people include blogging, youtube-ing a.k.a music and video sharing as well as online shopping. I’ll post a blog when I am free or if there is any interesting stuff to share with others. Youtube is very popular as I can search whatever materials I want to watch. I also used to pick and order some clothes or accessories online with my eldest sister. Furthermore, I’ll also visit Facebook to play online games and accept the challenges from net friends to play games together. Gaming is another important internet activity for me. Good games can train the logical thinking ability of a person and they can also help to reduce stress.

That is all for my introduction part. Thanks for viewing it.