Tutorial Blog 4

For my final blog post for my Spring semester ISM3004 class, I chose to discuss a topic that is growing in importance in today’s business world: NET Communications. With that being said, beginning with networks. By definition, “networks” are the collection of devices connected together via communication devices and transmission media.

("Network of People" Photograph. THE RAINMAKER BLOG. The Rainmaker Institute. Web. <http://www.therainmakerblog.com/uploads/image/network%20of%20people.jpg>.)

There are four types of networks:

• PAN: Personal Area Network
• LAN: Local Area Network
• MAN: Metropolitan Area Network
• WAN: Wide Area Network

Why use a network you may ask? Well the benefits of networking are plenty. First, networking allows the facilitating of communications. This is probably the greatest benefit as it allows for greater productivity and synergy.

Synergy – when the performance of 2 or more components working together exceeds the total performance of the components working separately.

Going back to benefits, through networking you can share software, hardware, and data and information – as well as transfer funds.

• While you have to beware of licensing issues, networks can facilitate software distribution and maintenance.
• Sharing hardware increases productivity because resources are then available online. Also, you can share your disk more efficiently than when used in a local disk.
• Sharing data and information increases employee productivity as well as enabling entire new categories of application. It gives your company also a competitive advantage and it is beneficial for the safety and security applied to your data

While there are plenty of benefits of networking, there are also some disadvantages as well. Not only is cost an issue, but security threats, loss of user autonomy, and lack of privacy are also dilemmas.

·     By security threats, I mean network based attacks against enterprise resources. Critical data on servers can be complied/divulged. You need to keep in mind that any system online is at risk. However, on a brighter note, there are proactive strategies to protect network resources.

·     By loss of user autonomy, I mean there are restrictions on software installation.

Attached here I have provided a YouTube showing a Mac commercial about networking:

YouTube

All in all, due to the accessibility and increased productivity that networking provides, it proves to become more and more integrated into today's business world. Attached you will find a few more links I provided about networking:

Types of Networks

Advantages & Disadvantages of Networking

Network vs. Stand Alone Computer

My first Digitally-Signed and Encripted E-mails

In my ISM3004 class, one of our projects as we draw closer to the end of the class, was to acquire a personal e-mail certificate and then send both a digitally signed and encrypted e-mail message. To do this, I first had to download Thunderbird (a e-mail system linked with Firefox) to access my UFL e-mail and send it. I have never used nor heard of Thunderbird prior to the project, and from it, have LOVED the program and will now use it as my primary e-mail carrier.

Upon downloading Thunderbird, I also had to download Firefox. This turned into an issue as the current version of Firefox is too new for my version of OS X on my MacBook. I then had to find an earlier version (Version 3.6) to download which was accessible with my computer.

Once that was completed, I was able to install a security certificate from Comodo (www.comodo.com/home/email-security/free-email-certificate.php). From that, I could export my certificate through Firefox and therefore configure Thunderbird to use my e-mail certificate to entail send my digitally-signed e-mail which then I received another e-mail with a certificate I could use to encrypt my next e-mail. Below is a screen capture I took showing my success on sending both e-mails:

From this project, I also looked into how using security is becoming more enforced (for protection purposes) in the business setting. In the article I found, entitled "Tampa Company Using Biometrics to Secure Computer Systems" on Tampa Bay Online (http://www2.tbo.com/content/2010/jan/07/071031/tampa-company-using-biometrics-secure-computer-sys/), it explains how the company, "Realtime North America is using biometric technology to help businesses and government agencies tighten their computer security." 

From the article I learned that with the use of biometric technology, that with a press or a swipe, it can recognize the user's unique fingerprint and then enable computers to restrict or allow the user access. The system to do this costs Realtime about $100,000. From this, "the benefit is that the computer administrator can assign by terminal who has access to the information and they have a recorded database - which shows who has access to data, when they access it and for how long and for what purpose," - stated Kenneth D. "Pete" Gunn (former director of safety and security of Space Florida) in the article. 

Realtime North America recommends a special mouse and keyboard that scans in the user's fingerprint to obtain a match - the technology is then used to restrict the log-on or level of security for various users. The system can also keep track of each user's activities, this could be helpful when looking at the productivity of the employee.

Finally, it states that Realtime North America believes that biometrics is the final frontier in protecting personal and corporate data - which therefore can save the company millions in fraud losses.

All in all, from this article, it showed me how important security is becoming in the business world and how it can save companies from both fraud and the expense fraud carries along with it.