A review on a post on Legal from My E-commerce blog

According to the blog title identity theft: Cases on stolen laptops, hacking and lost from My E-commerce blog http://ecommerze.blogspot.com/seach/label/Legal laptop was stolen and it potential risk is the data could be used to apply loans or credit cards under false names. Hackers broke into the systems of an Ohio hospital and it may cause potential abuse of the data A laptop was stolen from a hospital office data in the hard disk may not be encrypted. A university's server was hacked into and data maybe manipulate.

From the post, blogger actually mention and focus on how safe of our data. it has be seen from the cases, that our data easier be stolen even in hospital and university. Some information in the hospital or university may be modify by those theft. And personal data may also expose to outsider. In my opinion information that giving to hospital, bank and also university is important to keep in secret. That also responsibility of those hospital, bank and university to keep information in proper way. Who know one day information in bank was stole from the bank because bank just simple place information in a hard disk and that hard disk being theft? How if all money in bank being transfer to other person because their get account password from the hard disk being theft? And it also potential risk that information is used to apply credit card.

And even thought myself also will create password on my laptop to prevent one day if my laptop being theft. This is to safeguard my personal information that I stored in the computer. Who know who will became second Edison Chan if computer being theft. That not joking, we really need to protect our information that stored in our personal computer.

Lastly, my comment is that very important to protect our information and those bank, hospital and university should stored and keep our data and information well.

E-GOVERNMENT IN MALAYSIA

e-Government (from electronic government, also known as e-gov, digital government, online government or in a certain context transformational government) refers to the use of internet technology as a platform for exchanging information, providing services and transacting with citizens, businesses, and other arms of government.

The e-Government initiative was launched to lead the country into the Information Age. It will improve how the government operates internally, as well as how it delivers services to the people of Malaysia. It seeks to improve the convenience, accessibility and quality of interactions with citizens and businesses. At the same time, it will improve information flows and processes within government to improve the speed and quality of policy development, coordination and enforcement. This would enable the government to be more responsive to the needs of its citizens.

The e-Government provides services such as:
1. e-Filling (https://e.hasil.org.my/)
2. Renewing road tax (http://www.myeg.com.my/ or http://www.jpj.gov.my/)
3. Driving License Online (http://jpj.myeg.com.my/JPJSERVE/)
4. KWSP’s i-Akaun (http://www.kwsp.gov.my/index.php?ch=p2iakn&lang=en)
5. e-Perolehan (http://home.eperolehan.gov.my/en/default.aspx)

Citizen barriers toward adoption of e-Government service

Citizens 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. Success in delivering electronic services depends upon the capability and self-confidence of citizens in performing e-transactions, as well as their trust and confidence in the protection of their personal data within an open and accountable government. Citizens also face problems such as PC and internet connections cost, usage of PC for older citizens and availability of internet connections in rural area.

Government should make sure the decision and policy they made are keep pace with the technological change and progress in ICT and multimedia industries. E-Government needs marketing expertise in order to better promote awareness, encouragement and dissemination of information on the benefits that can be obtained by citizens and other users. Besides, the government can educate the future generations by introduce e-Government in education sector.

The vision of e-Government is a vision for government, businesses and citizenry working together for the benefit of Malaysia and its entire citizens. Therefore, all Malaysians should take responsibilities to promote e-Government including government employees.

Corporate blogging: A new marketing communication tool for companies

A business blog is an incredible online marketing tool that saves you thousands of dollars but provides great business opportunities in just one click. Blogs are user-friendly, customized and flexible medium for disseminating useful information for effective positioning of the products in the market.

In a survey, there are currently 14 million blogs with 80,000 more being added each day and about 30 percent of the 50 million users are blog readers. If the products are advertised through blogs, information spreads very quickly especially if an impressive write-up goes with the product. Soon the blogs will be passed on to hundreds of possible customers.For the example of corporate blog, you can see from Top 15 Corporate Blogs.

Open communication with customers creates trust and loyalty among them. Being there to respond to their questions and comments make them all the more willing to try products and services. It creates awareness and loyalty from the customers.

Blogs is good for product research and reviews. It would be easier to improve on the products if observe customers’ thinking and behavioral patterns. It can also help business to take immediate action to customers’ concerns, give them the feedback by selling the product fulfill their need and requirement.

Blog is a community halo-effect. Bloggers are reasonable, friendly and helpful. They are more than willing to create useful comments regarding the product. Then business can know how to

improve the product quality and product design. Thus it can increase customer satisfaction.

Blog is like a setup booth in the biggest trade show on earth everyday. It is a good marketing communication tool for company because it is cost effective and efficiency to communicate with customer. Marketing possibilities are just around the corner waiting to strike sale scales up.

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

(http://myphliputil.pearsoncmg.com/student/bp_turban_introec_1/Turban-Appendix2A.pdf
)
The internet provides an infrastructure for executing auction at lower administrative cost and with many more participating sellers and buyers. Electronic-auction or E-auction, which are auction conducted online, has been in existence for many years. Individual consumers and corporations alike can participate in this rapidly growing and very convenient form of e-commerce.

Prevent E-Auction Fraud

Escrow services

It is an easy-to-access link to a third-party escrow service; both partners in a deal are protected. The buyer mails the payment to the escrow service, which verifies the payment and alerts the seller when everything checks out. At that point, the seller ships the goods to the buyer. After an agreed-upon inspection period, the buyer notifies the service, which then sends a check to the seller.

Authentication service

Product authentication can detect whether the item is genuine. It is difficult to perform because it relies on the expertise of the authenticators. It needs experience in order to detect counterfeits based on subtle details. But, two authenticators may have different opinions about the authenticity of the same item.

Verification
The third parties will evaluate and identify an item through a variety of means such as some collectors have their item “DNA tagged” for identification purposes. This provides a way of tracking an item if it changes ownership in the future.

As a conclusion, consumers enjoy the convenient of e-auction, but they also need to aware that they are save from the online auction activities through gaining more knowledge before participating in the e- auction.

The Application of Pre-Paid Cash Card for Consumers

What is cash card? It is a type of scratch card, which allows postpaid customers to make payment or purchases through the network. Prepaid values are stored on cash cards form which purchases are deducted. These cards can only be redeemed at terminals set up to accept cash cards.

By using prepaid cash card, customers do not have to wait for the bill statement. Cash card allows customers to avoid disconnection by making advance payment form anywhere, anytime. It is very convenient for customers because they can avoid waiting in a long queue in the bank. Customers in the remote area, where banking facilities is unavailable, can get uninterrupted service.

Examples of prepaid cash card in Malaysia

Touch ‘n Go enhances the speed of paying for low value but high frequency transactions. Apart from the speed, it is also very convenient because user no longer need to prepare for small change or wait in queue at the cash lane to complete the transaction.
Touch 'n Go card is not only for toll fare but also parking services, theme park, and common ticketing system (CTS) for rail transit systems.
Besides, we can also use Touch ‘n Go card in
- Fast foods restaurants:

- Convenience stores:

- Cinemas: Cathay Cineleisure

Examples of prepaid cash card in Hong Kong

The Octopus card is a rechargeable contactless stored value smart card used to transfer electronic payments in online or offline systems in Hong Kong. The Octopus card was introduced for fare payment on the MTR initially, but the use of the card quickly expanded for multiple other purposes. The card can now be used to pay fares for all public transport in Hong Kong and to make purchases for consumer products at many stores in the city; it is accepted by more than 1,000 merchants.

Notable businesses that accept Octopus cards include PARKnSHOP, Wellcome, Watsons, 7-Eleven, Starbucks, McDonald's, and Circle K.

The card can be used in many soft drink vending machines, pay phones, photo booths, parking meters, and car parks. Aside from consumer transactions, Octopus cards can also be used for access control in buildings and for school administrative functions. At certain office buildings, residential buildings, and schools, usage of an Octopus card is required to access their facilities. As of 21 November 2004, all parking meters in Hong Kong had been converted to using the Octopus card as the form of payment.

Electronic Currency

Electronic currency also known as e-money, electronic cash,, digital money, digital cash or digital currency). Electronoc currency refers to money or scrip which is exchanged only electronically. Typically, this involves use of computer networks, the internet and digital stored value systems. Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) and direct deposit are examples of electronic money. Also, it is a collective term for financial cryptography and technologies enabling it.

One rare success has been Hong Kong's Octopus card system, which started as a transit payment system and has grown into a widely used electronic cash system. Singapore also has an electronic currency implementation for its public transportation system (commuter trains, bus) A very successful implementation is in the Netherlands, known as Chipknip.

Public-key cryptography and digital signatures (both blind and non-blind signatures) make e-money possible. It would take too long to go into detail how public-key cryptography and digital signatures work. But the basic gist is that banks and customers would have public-key encryption keys. Public-key encryption keys come in pairs. A private key known only to the owner, and a public key, made available to everyone. Whatever the private key encrypts, the public key can decrypt, and vice verse.

There are two varieties of each type of electronic currency: online e-money and offline e-money. Online means you need to interact with a bank (via modem or network) to conduct a transaction with a third party. Offline means you can conduct a transaction without having to directly involve a bank. Offline anonymous e-money (true digital cash) is the most complex form of e-money because of the double-spending problem.

The are examples for electronic currency:

• BitPass - Established Dec 2002, Shut down Jan 2007
  


• Click and Buy - still in operation
  


• PayLoadz - still in operation
  


• Paystone Technologies - still in operation
  


• Peppercoin - - still in operation
  


• Beenz- collapsed in 2001
  


• DigiCash - pioneer of electronic currency, filed for bankruptcy in 1998. A new DigiCash was established recently.
  


• Flooz - established Feb 1999, closed down in August 2001

With using electronic currency, it make our life became easy and not need have to keep a lot of money in the purse.

Credit Card debts: Cause and prevention

Many credit card holder facing a problem-too much credit card debt and unable to meet credit card payment obligations, unable to afford what they really want because every extra cent has to go towards keeping up with the minimum payments on their credit cards. Other than that, some college student also facing the credit card debts (College Student Journal,

Sept, 2002by Jill M. Norvilitis, Phillip Santa Maria).

An important cause of credit card debt is people keep charging items that couldn't afford, use those little plastic cards for things that weren't necessary. Normally, people are trying to pay off yesterday's purchases, many of which have long since worn out or been forgotten, how will we acquire the things that we truly want for tomorrow?

One negative aspect of using credit cards instead of cash is that we don't feel like we're spending real money. We forget about the unpleasant or painful feelings of making the payment for the credit card statement. Studies show that most people are much less likely to buy, or will spend less, when paying with cash as opposed to credit cards. The best solution for this situation is trying leaving the credit cards at home, pay with cash, check, or a debit card.

To really prevent from spending and credit card debt, we need to examine what money means to us, and the attitudes about money. Make an effort to notice how to interact with money and efficiency way to use the money.

Another study also shows that people with low self-esteem engage in more impulse spending and buying things they don't need. Remind ourselves lack of money doesn't determine who we are. Our worth as a person has nothing to do with how much money we have. As we begin to build up feelings of self-worth and develop a positive attitude about ourselves and about money, we'll attract positive things into life. By doing so, we'll feel less of a need to generate positive feelings by purchasing things, and we'll find it easier to stop buying items we don't really need.

As a conclusion, credit card is very convenient and useful for people but it causing some people having problem to pay the credit card debts. Thus we must know how to control desire to buy the thing we don’t really need.

Mobile payment systems in Malaysia: Its potentials and consumer’s adoption strategies.

What is Mobile Payment Systems?
Mobile payment is the collection of money from a consumer via a mobile device such as their mobile phone, SmartPhone, Personal Digital Assistant (PDA) or other such device. Today, worldwide adoption of mobile payment systems is increasing, still more slowly than expected. Mobile payment can be used to purchase any goods, such as, music, videos and books.

The Mobile Money Wallet
The example of mobile payment system in Malaysia is MOBILE MONEY. It is a PIN-based Mobile Payment Solution designed by Mobile Money International Sdn Bhd to address the limitations created by cash, cheques and credit cards. It allowing registered users to pay for goods and services at anytime, anywhere using only a mobile phone coupled with a 6-digit security PIN (Personal Identification Number) via SMS (Short Messaging Service). This gives the freedom to shoppers to buy products online and pay the merchant using his/her mobile phone without being physically present at the store.

Customers are Encouraged to Use it
Mobile payment system is simple and convenient system for mobile users to make payments through mobile devices. In today’s world, almost everyone has a mobile phone in hand. This is also one of the reasons that mobile payment system is getting more and more popular. Other than that, it is also fast and efficient. Mobile payment system provides fast response and quick payment processing. This will save a lot of time for the businessman who is very busy dealing their business. Besides, mobile payment system is universal acceptance. It allow customer to pay anyone and anywhere using mobile payment through wireless networking.

Conclusion
As a conclusion, mobile payment system has brought convenient to every user. It will become more popular in the future because technology is part of our life.

PHISHING : Examples and Prevention

Phishing is a scam in which the attacker sends an email purporting to be from a valid financial or eCommerce provider. The email often uses fear tactics in an effort to entice the intended victim into visiting a fraudulent website.

Once on the website, which generally looks and feels much like the valid eCommerce/banking site, the victim is instructed to login to their account and enter sensitive financial information such as their bank PIN number, their Social Security number, mother's maiden name, etc.

EXAMPLES

eBay phishing scam

This eBay phishing email includes the eBay logo in an attempt to gain credibility. The email warns that a billing error may have been made on the account and urges the eBay member to login and verify the charges.
Scammers phish on ebay to obtain eBay ID's which then are used to sell fake or non-existent goods or such accounts can be sold further in the underground market. In other words, the new owners of stolen eBay ID's now are equipped with positive feedback, previously generated by the real owner, and are now used to scam people.

(Click to view large)

Look at the link here. It looks as valid as it could. It is written http://signin.ebay.com, but this written link actually points again, yes, to a clone of ebay. This is done with a href code in html coding. I will show you an example. Click on this link:

http://www.ebay.com

The Address shows ebay, but you were linked to amazon. I have linked you to amazon, but Con artist will link you to dupes of legit business websites and scam you. Beware what you click, your browser shows you the link in the left bottom corner if you only point over the link, without clicking it.

Find out more in http://www.bustathief.com/2007/08/what-is-phishing-ebay-phishing-examples.html

Another example of phishing is Paypal. Paypal is becoming the online payment processor of choice for many users. Paypal allows virtually anyone to except credit card payments. Paypal is also a great way to send and receive electronic payments. Unfortunate fame has it’s price and in the case of Paypal that means scam artists preying on the Paypal members.
The most common Paypal Scam involves e-mail. You will receive an e-mail from someone claiming to be Paypal requesting you verify your information. Look out for warning signs below to identify phishing scam:

Warning Sign1 : Paypal will never send you an E-Mail Requesting Your Personal Information
Warning Sign2 : Often this e-mail will be sent to an e-mail address that is not the same one that Paypal has on file.
Warning Sign3: Forged Headers (from address). This is often hard to detect without knowledge of the Internet. Many spam filters are now setup to block e-mail that has forged headers. Ask your e-mail provider how you can block Forged Headers.
Warning Sign4: Greetings. Paypal knows who you are they will use the name you registered with.

Warning Sign5: Threats. The e-mail will threaten to suspend your account if you don’t take immediate action.
Warning Sign6: Non Secure Page. If you do click on the link in the E-Mail you will not be on a secure Page, No Https in the URL and no little Padlock in the lower left hand corner of your browser.
Warning Sign7: Bad Grammar or Misspelled words

If you receive an E-mail from Paypal with even 1 of these warning signs more likely it is a scam.

PREVENTION

There are several different techniques to combat phishing, including legislation and technology created specifically to protect against phishing.

Social responses

One strategy for combating phishing is to train people to recognize phishing attempts, and to deal with them. Education can be promising, especially where training provides direct feedback. People can take steps to avoid phishing attempts by slightly modifying their browsing habits. When contacted about an account needing to be "verified" (or any other topic used by phishers), it is a sensible precaution to contact the company from which the e-mail apparently originates to check that the e-mail is legitimate. Alternatively, the address that the individual knows is the company's genuine website can be typed into the address bar of the browser, rather than trusting any hyperlinks in the suspected phishing message.

Technical responses

1. Helping to identify legitimate sites
Some anti-phishing toolbars display the domain name for the visited website. The petname extension for Firefox lets users type in their own labels for websites, so they can later recognize when they have returned to the site. If the site is suspect, then the software may either warn the user or block the site outright.

2. Browsers alerting users to fraudulent websites
Another popular approach to fighting phishing is to maintain a list of known phishing sites and to check websites against the list. Microsoft's IE7 browser, Mozilla Firefox 2.0, and Opera all contain this type of anti-phishing measure. Firefox 2 uses Google anti-phishing software. Opera 9.1 uses live blacklists from PhishTank and GeoTrust, as well as live whitelists from GeoTrust. Some implementations of this approach send the visited URLs to a central service to be checked, which has raised concerns about privacy.

3. Eliminating phishing mail
Specialized spam filters can reduce the number of phishing e-mails that reach their addressees' inboxes. These approaches rely on machine learning and natural language processing approaches to classify phishing e-mails.

Many of these phishing emails appear to be quite legitimate. Don't be a victim. Look over the following examples of phishing scams to familiarize yourself with the clever techniques used.

The application of third party certification programme in Malaysia

Third-parties called certificate authority issues digital certificates used to create digital signatures and public-private key pairs. The role of the third party in this process is to guarantee that the individual granted the unique certificate is, in fact, who he or she claims to be certificate authority are a critical component in data security and e-commerce because they guarantee that the two parties exchanging information are really who they claim to be. A digital certificate is an electronic certificate that establishes your credentials when doing business or other transactions on the Web. The certificate is issued by a Certification Authority (CA).

Example of third party in Malaysia is MSC Trustgate.com Sdn Bhd(www.msctrustgate.com). It is a licensed Certification Authority (CA) operating out of the Multimedia Super Corridor. MSC Trustgate was incorporated in 1999 to meet the growing need for secure open network communications and become the catalyst for the growth of e-commerce, both locally and across the ASEAN region. In present, MSC Trustgate has 12 million in paid up capital.

Trustgate has been licensed under the Digital Signature Act 1997 (DSA), a Malaysia law that sets a global precedent for the mandate of a CA. As a CA, Trustgate’s core business is to provide digital certification services, including digital certificates, cryptographic products, and software development.

Verisign is the leading Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) Certificate Authority enabling secure e-commerce, communications, and interactions for Web sites, intranets, and extranets. Choose the most trusted mark on the Internet and enable the strongest SSL encryption available to every site visitor.

The application of third parties certificate in Malaysia are when a website visitor connects to a web server using digital certificate they will see that the URL in the address bar begins with https:// rather than the usual http:// and also a small gold padlock will appear in their browser, e.g.
As seen by users of Internet Explorer

Whenever a browser connects to a webserver (website) over https:// - this signifies that the communication will be encrypted and secure. The actual complexities of the digital certificate protocol remain invisible to the end customer.

All digital certificates are issued to either companies or legally accountable individuals. Typically SSL Certificates contain the domain name, the company name, the address i.e. city, state and country. It will also contain the expiry date of the Certificate and details of the Certification Authority responsible for the issuance of the Certificate.

When a browser connects to a secure site it will retrieve the site's digital certificate and check that it has not expired, that it has been issued by a Certification Authority the browser trusts and that it is being used by the website for which it has been issued. If it fails on any one of these checks the browser will display a warning to the end user.


So both party in a deal are protected. The buyer mail the payment to the escrow services , which verify the payment and alert the seller when every things check out. At that point, the seller ship the goods to the buyer . after an agreed upon inspection period, the buyer notifies the service, which then send a escrow services. So. it impletation help to improve customers trust between both seller and buyer

As a conclusion, the application of third party certification programme in Malaysia make the online dealing more safety and increase trustiness
.

The treat of online security: How safe is our data?

Nowadays, getting more people using the internet to communicate with others, search for information and also engaged in the online transaction. Internet give us become more convenient because internet is an easy and useful tool that help people to do thing with lesser cost and more efficiency.But, as the internet users display more of their personal information on social networking web sites, and office workers upload more sensitive data to online software programs, computer hackers are employing increasingly sophisticated methods to pry that information loose. In many cases, they are devising small attacks that can go into traditional security software, while exploiting the trust users place in popular business and consumer Web sites.
Threats to e-commerce systems can be either malicious or accidental. Malicious threats could include hackers attempting to penetrate a system to read or alter sensitive data, burglars stealing a server or laptop that has unprotected sensitive data on its disk, imposters posing as legitimate users and even creating a website similar to yours, authorized users downloading a web page or receiving an email with hidden active content that attacks your systems or sends sensitive information to unauthorized people.

Some of the more common threats that hackers pose to e-commerce systems include carrying out denial-of-service (DoS), attacks that stop access to authorized users of a website, so that the site is forced to offer a reduced level of service or, in some cases, ceases operation completely, gaining access to sensitive data such as price lists, catalogues and valuable intellectual property, and altering, destroying or copying it altering the company’s website, thereby damaging company’s image or directing the customers to another site, gaining access to financial information about the business or customers, with a view to perpetrating fraud and using viruses to corrupt business data. These kinds of targeted attacks on Web-based services may constitute the top computer security threats of 2008 (BusinessWeek.com, 11/12/07).

As a conclusion, there are many threats to online security, so when doing online transaction must have proper safeguard such as encryption, digital certificate and firewall. With the safeguard, our data will be safer since the threat is so serious.

How to safeguard our personal and financial data?

Internet and all the on-line transaction have created convenient to all the users. However, there are getting more and more doubt on the internet security. There is a problem exist when user making transaction such as on-line banking. User will concern about the web security when they entering their private and confidential data into the system or website. It is especially important to take extra security precautions to safeguard the data in order to prevent lost of private and confidential information.

Encryption

(http://bluefive.pair.com/articles_encryption_and_decryption.htm )
How to safeguard our personal and financial data??? Encryption is one of the safeguard. Encryption is the conversion of data into a secret code for storage in the databases and transmission over network. The sender uses an encryption algorithm to convert the original message into a coded equivalent. At the receiving end the cipher text is decoded back into clear text. This can prevent leaking and lost of data.

Firewall

(http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/Use-Network-Firewalls-To-Protect-Your-System/60788)
Besides, firewall can also protect user’s personal and financial data. Firewall is a system used to protect an organization’s intranet from the internet. It can be used to verify an outside user of the network, verify his or her level of access authority, and then direct the user to the program, data, or service requested. Most organization is using firewall to protect their private and confidential information.

Password

(http://www.securityfocus.com/infocus/1192 )
Other than that, creating secure passwords is also very important to safeguard our personal and financial data. Password is a secret code entered by the user to gain access to systems, applications data, or a network server. If the user cannot provide the correct password, the operating system should deny access. This can limited to those user that has password can access to the system.

As a conclusion, there is also other method to safeguard our personal and financial data. Adequate and appropriate safeguard is very important to each and every user as well as the organization in order to maintain correct and clear data or information.

How e-commerce can reduce cycle time, improve employees’ empowerment and facilitate customer support?

Why use E-commerce??

Reduce Cycle Time

Traditionally, producers sell their products to customers through intermediaries such as wholesaler and retailer. E-commerce eliminates those middlemen between sellers and buyers by removing links from trading chain and put producers directly in touch with the customers. It provides a 24 hours store that also reduces sale cycle and reduces unnecessary phone calls and mailings.

Improves Employees’ Empowerment

E-commerce also improves employees’ empowerment where provides enabling technologies for the company’s employees. It can improve employee knowledge and effectiveness, which reduces contact handle times. Other than that, E-commerce increase employees’ empowerment by providing better decision support and reference tools and provide desktop enhancement for employees for data access and retrieval. Thus, it improves employees’ morale and loyalty.

Facilitates Customer Support

On the consumer level, an individual can go online to purchase anything from books, grocery to expensive items like real estate, online bill payments, buying stocks, transferring funds from one account to another, and initiating wire payment to another country. All these activities can be done with a few keystrokes on the keyboard. Using e-commerce gives customers the opportunity and shop at their convenience and at their place. They can access into e-commerce from home, office, or on the road, 24 hours a day, and 7 days a week. Besides, it slowly builds loyalty since it is so convenient and saves time.

The history and evolution of E-Commerce

The word E-Commerce or electronic commerce was founded late in the 1970’s. The term was introduced for transactions done via computer to computer.

There have been several key steps in the history and evolution of E-Commerce. To interchange data and to carry out business deals electronically in 1960’s Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) was formulated. Initially ecommerce was facilitating business transactions electronically using technology such as EDI (electronic data interchange) and EFT (electronic funds transfer) to send business documents such as purchase orders or invoices. However, in 1984 the ASC X12 standard became stable and reliable in transferring large amounts of transactions. In 1969 ARPANET, was developed by Americas department of defence for researching new reliable networks and later this enhanced into Internet that was purely used as a research tool for nearly 20yrs.

In 1991, Tim Berners-Lee developed World Wide Web at CERN that started the first Internet transaction. These technology supported exchange of data that was in text format only. The next major step occurred in 1993, Mosiac was developed by Marc Andreessen, this is the first graphic web browser. The Mosaic browser was quickly adapted into a downloadable browser. Netscape, the most successful graphic browser was later developed by Marc Andreessen. On the other hand, Microsoft came up with Microsoft Internet Explorer. The first business deal took place in 1994 and since then there have been billions of dealings.

Later in 1998 DSL was launched into the market that provided much faster access and persistent connection to the internet. A major merger, in early 2000, between AOL and Time Warner was another major push for electronic commerce. The merger, worth $350 million, brought together a major online company with a traditional company. In February 2000 hackers attacked some major players of E-Commerce, including Yahoo, eBay and Amazon. In light of these attacks the need for improved security in the development of electronic commerce

As the websites grew the importance of internet today is thousands of times what it was only a decade ago. E-Commerce is a new form of business that has developed rapidly. It provides a different mode of doing business that helps reduce labour cost and much faster transaction

An example of E-commerce success and it causes

E-commerce is defined as “the sharing of business information, maintaining business relationships and conducting business transactions by means of telecommunications networks”. It also includes various processes within and outside the organization in addition to buying and selling activities.

Generally, there are some rules for a successful e-commerce website. First of all, the retailer has a product or products that meet the customer need. After that, the retailer needs to use the website to advertise the product and make the website as attractive as possible, displays the product to best advantage.

For online payment systems and credit card processing, the retailer must ensure that customers feel secure in the online transaction. It is because customers are very concern about the level of security when providing sensitive information online and will use e-commerce only when they develop a certain level of trust. So the retailer must ensure the transaction is fully secured and no unauthorized access. The retailer makes it easy for customers to purchase products by using the credit card or e-banking systems.

The success case of e-commerce is bookseller

www.ABE.com , with no venture capital, is presently

slaughtering the VC-funded S.F. ABE.com did a lot of things right on the web, they put up a simple, user-friendly web site that delivered what the customers wanted, a good selection of used books at good prices.

But they did even more things right at the back end. For example, they left the books right where they were, sitting in low-rent used bookstore space. Alibris took possession of the books, piling up warehouse rental costs, labor costs, and doubling their shipping costs. ABE.com acted modestly, an appropriate stance in the quiet world of used bookselling. Alibris spend money with splashy advertisements in New Yorker magazine. ABE.com went out of their way to accommodate computer-illiterate used booksellers, by accepting inventory data in virtually any format. And not least, ABE.com answered the telephone, and they were pleasant to customers and suppliers alike.

As a conclusion, E-commerce success is not so easy, it need a clear vision and goal, patient and long-term view and embrace technology and change.

An example (pets.com) of an E-commerce failure and its cause

Today, businessmen are expending their business through internet in order to compete with their competitor. Businesses often rely on the Web to attract clients, communicate with suppliers, and generate revenues. As a result, the cost of failed online transactions can be significant even a single hour of downtime could cost a retailer thousands of dollars in lost sales. The use of the internet and web to transact business is called E-commerce. E-commerce had brought success to most of the businessman. However, there are also some failures. Now, let us look at some causes of failure in E-commerce and a real world example.

Causes of failures in E-commerce
The causes of failures in E-commerce can divide into four categories namely: software failures, operator error, hardware failures, and security violations. Software failure is failures occur during routine maintenance, software upgrades and system integration. Operator error occurs when the operator either omits an action or executes an incorrect action during system maintenance. Other than that, a hardware failure is also one of causes of E-commerce failure. It can occur for several reasons, for example, wear and tear of mechanical parts and loose wiring. Besides, some common security violations that occur in websites are password disclosures, Denial of Service (DOS) attacks, worms and viruses and theft.

A real life example
Pets.com (1998-2000) The important dot-com lesson was that advertising, never able to give pet owners a persuasive reason to buy pet online. Afteno matter how clever, cannot save you. Pets.com was r they ordered a pet, a customer had to wait a few days to actually get it. Moreover, because the company had to undercharge for shipping costs to attract customers, it actually lost money on most of the items it sold.

As a conclusion, all of the relailer need to enhance their operation and maintenance in order to prevent failure and become success in E-commerce.