Barriers to implementing Information Technology

Without a doubt, politics, policy and ethics play a big role in Information Technology. For example, In developing countries, researches have struggled to study and implement Information Technology because of lack of skilled professionals in the field. Poor quality and quantity of telecommunications infrastructure has also been a barrier that need to be overcome.  In developing countries, some of the reasons why they are only growing at a very slow pace are that most web-based programs and most software produced are in English and the rate of computer illiteracy amongst employees is very high.  As we all know construction plays a big role in the advancement of a country and without the appropriate technology and equipment workers and employers only stick to the old ways which are not nearly as effective as if they were implementing the newest technology out there. The other issue mentioned was that people would need to learn English and then get training to use whatever technology is being used. These steps would involve politics and decisions that would have to be made by the governments, also salaries would have to increase, companies would have to invest a lot more money into technology equipment, and it would take years. Researchers continue to study the lack of I.T. in developing countries and the effect on how fast they are growing. Of course these studies can only provide information on the matter but it would depend on what each country decides to do about it. click for more on this subject

Data Security Approach for Right to Information of Developer

Due to hackers and all the data breaches that occur every so often in today’s age, the Information Technology field has been turning its focus on how to protect sensitive data. This article talks about the importance of not only examining the network to check for intruders but to also keep a record of how, what and where data is being accessed from. By doing this we can add that extra layer of security keeping important data safe. The proposed method to approach this idea by the authors is to develop an IP tracker. An IP address is a series of numbers which contains the important information about the user on the other side. For example, by keeping track of the IP address used to access a website, we can trace the address back and see the route that it took to get there, therefore we will know the exact starting point, time, and see if the same address is being used to get to the data.  After the IP tracker captures the IP address of the user, it will store its information in a database that will hold a certain amount of IP address, and that can be emptied out by the administrator as pleased. The outcome or impact of this research and proposed methodology is that companies and organizations can generate statistics of who access their programs, data, website, etc. In case of a data breach at least there will be a set amount of locations based on statistical information of where the most IP traffic comes from and at what time of the day of the week for instance.

We can already tell how more and more methods are being proposed in order to protect sensitive data and counterattack hackers.  Without a doubt Information Security is becoming top priority in the Technology field.  

Aggarwal, Vivek Data Security approach for Right to Information of Developer. International journal of advanced research in computer science. (05/01/2013) ,  4 (3), p. 292 - 294.

Famous researcher/scientist/Inventor in the Technology World

In This blog post we will stay in the field of technology but putting Information Security aside for a bit. I will introduce a person who has had a huge impact in the world of Information Technology , Computer Science and the whole world in general. Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee, also known as TimBL, was born in London, England in 1955. TimBL is a computer scientist, and his biggest achievement is the invention of the World Wide Web, or “www” in the beginning of every URL. His proposal was made in 1989 which was when he first implemented the first communication between a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) client and server via the Internet. TimBL is the director of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which supervises the Web’s development, the founder of the World Wide Web Foundation, and also a senior researcher and holder of the Founder’s Chair at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory(CSAIL).  In 2004, TimBL was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II for his work, and in 2009 he was elected a foreign associate of the United States National Academy of Sciences.  Berners-Lee’s impact in the world of technology and communications and the society in general has been one of the greatest of all time. We can all agree that without the Internet and its wonderful communications network we wouldn’t be where we are now with technology.  It is the Internet which facilitates our ability to communicate instantaneously with each other using a cell phone, a computer, or anything that has the capability of connecting to the Internet and sending and receiving signals. In conclusion, along with the invention of the telephone, computer, and cell phone, this is probably one of the greatest inventions of the century.  During the 2012 summer Olympics opening ceremony, TimBL was honored as the “inventor of the World Wide Web”. tim_berners_lee's TED talks

Ebay has been CyberAttacked

As stated in the introductory post, it is crucial to be on top and alert of all information securities’ “barriers” in order to keep important data safe from attackers or hackers to be more technical. A recent incident happened when Ebay suffered a cyber attack and thousands of member’s accounts and passwords were stolen.  The hackers in this case were able to gain access to the companie’s corporate network, this all resulted with every single user having to change their passwords and login credentials. This kind of attack can get dangerous in the fact that by stealing member’s login credentials, hackers can get access to people’s credit card information, home addresses, phone numbers, shopping history, etc. As scary as it sounds, It is sometimes impossible to be prepared for every single cyber attack because security specialists just can’t predict in what way and using which network resources the hackers will try to penetrate the network. As stated in the introduction of this blog, Security experts cann only be on the lookout examining  suspicious network traffic constantly  in case there is an “intruder” in the network that shouldn’t be there. Of course it is not just the Information Security Officer’s duty to protect the network , software engineers also need to develop software programs that are secure and hard to hack into. Network administrators are also responsible when it comes to providing network access to strangers and how much of the network resources each of the users connected to the network are permitted to use and for how long. This particular incident about ebay is an example of a breach in one of their databases ( which could be on the software engineer’s side), but of course no one will ever know how and using what the intruders were able to penetrate the network. Ebay says “it is working with law enforcement and leading security experts to “aggressively” investigate the matter”. more on this article

Introduction to Information Security

Information Security an area of the Information Technology field.  We can all agree that data in businesses, organizations, and even our own personal data needs to be protected.  Organizations hire a team of Information Security specialists to keep their businesses running while securing their data. When it comes to personal data, we all as regular users can have updated anti-viruses installed in our computers. Information Security does not only protect data stored within our networks, but it also protects data while it is being transmitted throughout the internet, for example, by e-email, instant message, etc. Without going into details about how this complex procedure works, in summary, the data being transmitted gets broken apart in bits of pieces and going through algorithms to finally become encrypted. No one else can open that document or data because it contains an encryption key that only the recipient has access to. While this is only a technique used to transmit data securely over the internet, securing data in a regular day basis for an organization also has techniques based on the infrastructure of the network. Of course it couldn’t be as simple as just implementing security in the business world. Information Security Specialists have to be able to determine just about how much security is to be implemented without slowing down business productivity. Sometimes if there is too much security implemented, users may be restricted to some network resources, such as online network services or files and documents needed to get their particular jobs done. 

In conclusion, there will always be a tradeoff between Information Security and Network Resource 
Availability. Specialists can only strive for the perfect balance between the two, but after many studies and 
research on the topic, there will always be a tradeoff, it is just a matter of how important the data being secured is, and the overall network infrastructure. More on Introduction to Information Security.