A Short History of the Blockchain Technology When an unknown scientist under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto published his white paper about Bitcoin – a “purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash”– in 2008, it was not the cryptocurrency itself but its underlying mechanism, known today as the blockchain, that was considered revolutionary. But overall awareness of the blockchain technology remained rather limited, as Bitcoin itself was not yet widely known. Starting in the year 2012, increasing activity surrounding Bitcoin could be observed, as the cryptocurrency’s market capitalization grew and start-ups in the field of payments and coin wallets started to emerge. But still, Bitcoin and the underlying blockchain remained subject to a general scepticism, being associated mainly with the financing of rather sketchy online activities and other misconceptions. Nonetheless, by the year 2014, over 80 uses of blockchains had been reported. Slowly, the initial scepticism gave way to the increasing efforts of Continue reading
Information Technology
Case Study of FedEx: Pioneer of Internet Business in the Global Transportation and Logistics Industry
Transportation is one of the largest industries in the world, and its sector range is very wide which include taxis, truck, train, ships, barges, airplanes, pipelines, warehouse and logistics service. For the industry, the three main trends were globalization of business, information technology development and new technology to support process efficient, and the market demand for more value-added. Hence, the companies in transportation and logistics industry depend on the global network of distribution centres to gain quick payment cycle and cheaper resources. In FedEx Corporation, as a leader firm in the industry, its centralized structures have always required, and facilitated billion dollar investments in IT and established the website from 1994. It provided a successful technology for the FedEx Corporation as a pioneer in the whole industry for e-business. This strategy became an advantage that they used to undermine their competitors’ strengths and localized customer service. With a globally connected Continue reading
Data Ethics – Meaning, Risks and Mitigation
In the world of today, there is a rising increase in the amount of data being collected each day. This data is further being divulged across several environments, sectors, and industries. In most scenarios, the process of collecting data is really not a big deal but the ability and technicality of managing the large amount of data collected become an unending struggle. The struggle to effectively manage the exploding volume of data has led to increased prominence in the ethical use of data. For this reason and more, it has caused the establishment of policies to ensure there is a check and balance as to how data is being shared with the sole purpose of protecting the integrity of people who own this information. In addition, people or organizations who are charged with the role of gathering, distributing, and using this data keep exploring the ethics of their practices and, Continue reading
Case Study of Cisco: Transformation of Entire Supply Chain into an Extended Enterprise System
Cisco Systems of San Jose, California, is a company that develops networking devices such as switches, routers, network management software, and dial- up access servers. By the mid 1990s, realizing that growth depended on our ability to scale manufacturing, distribution and other supply chain processes quickly, Cisco managers decided to reinvent its business model and turn itself into a Web-enabled company. An ‘ecosystem’ which in fact transformed the entire supply chain into an extended enterprise system based on internet technology was created in order to links customers, prospects, partners, suppliers and employees in a multi-party, multi-location electronic network. E-Business can be defined as all electronically mediated information exchanges, both within an organisation and with external stakeholders supporting the range of business processes. It links internal employees with external customers, suppliers through technology like Internet, intranets, and extranets. E-commerce, conceived as a subset of e-business, can be categorized as buy-side e-commerce Continue reading
Data Warehousing – Meaning, Benefits and Implications
What is Data Warehousing? The term data warehouse or data warehousing was first coined by Bill Inmon in the year 1990 which was defined as a “warehouse which is subject-oriented, integrated, time variant and non-volatile collection of data in support of management’s decision making process”. When referring to data warehousing as subject oriented, it simply means that the process is giving information about a particular subject rather than the details regarding the on-going operations of the company. Moreover, when data warehousing was referred to as integrated it means that the data or information which are gathered from a number of sources are then all gathered to synthesize a coherent whole. On the other hand, data warehousing being time variant simply means that the data available were identified on a particular period. Lastly, data warehousing as being non-volatile means that the data is stable and when a new data is added Continue reading
Why Information Security is Needed?
Information Security is very important from day to day life to protect your Information online. Leaning how to protect yourself online can benefit you in many ways by keeping your identity form being stolen or your bank account being compromised. Everyday people are led into scams to take information to use it for their own cause. Also learning Information Security is easy to get into. There are many websites and articles to read on to learn about attacks and what to do in a situation. Also learning about privy on social media can help with noticing scams that hackers use on victims. So, it’s best for someone to take the time and learn about the importance of information security. At the current technology era, information is a critical asset and should thus be protected at all costs. Information security refers to preventing unauthorized access to data in a manner that Continue reading