Managing Information 2 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Managing Information 2 - Essay Example As a result there are a number of IT-related issues that have arisen in the recent past; some of them are discussed herein after. IT-related Issues Protecting information confidentiality certainly ranks among the most pressing IT-related issues. This relates to how an information professional or any other person who has access to privileged information should treat it and handle it to ensure it does not get into the wrong hands and become detrimental to others (Strassman, 2000). It is therefore logical that information presented as confidential should be treated as such. A lot of people are required to provide their personal information such as full names, residence, age, gender, social security number, personal identification card numbers and a lot of other private information when applying for credit cards, visas and other legal documents; if not handled with the required confidentiality this information can be used by fraudsters and impersonators to siphon cash from the unsuspecti ng public. An information technology professional should ensure that confidential information is handled with confidentiality. For instance, by not tapping other peoples’ phones or conducting surveillance that intrudes the privacy of others. The other issue is privacy. Traditionally, everyone is legally entitled to reasonable privacy. Under the privacy rights a person is entitled to reasonable secrecy, anonymity and solitude (Payne and Landry, 2006). Anonymity guarantees that the person is not subjected to undesired attention; secrecy ensures that personalized information is not distributed to other people who are not privy to it while solitude allows one to physically be away from other people. This has not changed even in the face of the fast changing technological environment. These days, with the closed circuit television cameras, one can gain access into another person’s private life and know every little detail of it. The dilemma arises when determining whether i t is ethical and legal to do so (Davis, 2010). The determination is however not easy as the subject is complex and multifaceted and depends on the circumstances or the environment. For example, there are countries that will allow the infringement of privacy rights for the purpose of national security. At the same time there are proponents that argue that one’s’ privacy rights should never be violated for any reason. Information professionals are mandated to handle privileged information. With this privilege comes a responsibility; that of ensuring that that information does not cause harms in their way of creation, organization, dissemination and use (Jana, 1998). The ethical and moral codes governing human conduct should be observed. This information need not necessarily affect individuals directly; they may affect a country’s security or economy. A case in point is that of Julian Assange, the editor of WikiLeaks who released classified information of different countries to the public. Assange is an informational technologist and an accomplished computer programmer. He got in possession of some sensitive information, some that directly impact on the national security of the US yet he went ahead to disseminate that information without considering the harm it could do (Burstein, 2012). IT innovation has enabled rapid dissemination of

Yahoo Inc Case Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Yahoo Inc - Case Study Example It is a multilingual consumer interface accessible in 20 foreign languages over the planet, including English. Jerry Yang along with David Filo who were scholars from Stanford created the website in the first month of 1994. In the beginning, the site was named after Jerry referring to it as a guide to World Wide Web (WWW). It served the purpose of a directory since it linked with other websites in a chronological order. It was again named â€Å"Yahoo!† three months later in the same year, where it gained remarkable viewer hits. The exclamation mark was added as a trademark to register it under the law to avoid the resource infringement. In an effort to improve the service range to motivate the users to utilize extra time at the site, Yahoo launched an online e-mail service called four one one (411). The firm acquired Rocket mail, in addition to, Classic Games lines to expand its varieties that were by now common. In the year 2000, on the onset of millennium, Yahoo recorded the ir best results in the dot-com period when the revenue collection rose by 4.5%. In addition to that, the company merged with Google command searches since one would access the sites on either accounts. This resulted to Yahoo inventing a modern technology that would enable its viewers to enjoy their services directly. The deal that existed between the two firms was broken when the invention took place-precipitating creation of 2GB storage accounts, the opposite of Google’s 1GB. Major Issues or Problems of the Organization Every organization must face challenges in the formative stages and during the routine operations. Yahoo Corporation was faced with the challenges of account hackers, brain drain and cyber crimes. The common and most prevalent crisis at Yahoo is the hacking of accounts where respondents claim that at one time or the other their accounts have been hacked. Hacking is an art where an individual intentionally or unintentionally access an account of the other for security reasons or by clicking malicious links. Account hacks causes are mostly use of general Internet terminals or Wi-Fi prior to the attack. Moreover, they connect to links that might result to malicious locations. Almost every time, the hacked accounts, are used to distribute spams and frauds. The best way to avoid this is by altering the passwords to a secure one or applying different passwords foe every website frequented. Extra vigilance should be practiced when using public terminals. Another challenge is the brain drain experienced at Yahoo Corporation whereby staffs are leaving the firm at an alarming rate to set up competing firms. The best employees at the firm are speedily leaving to join other rival firms or set their personal firms. This is a challenge to Yahoo because these gone staffs understand the weaknesses and strengths of the firm which they can employ to their gain. Lastly, cyber crimes are illegal measures on the net that pose security issues to the users. T he cyber crimes comprise of software piracy, e-mail spying and credit card swindles which invade the privacy of the users. It is feared that the modern fraudsters loot more money through Internets than robberies. These crimes are directed to individuals, properties or institutions. Cyber crime rules have been enacted to curb the spread of these crimes to innocent, unsuspecting users (Wall, 2007). Competitive Environment As borrowed from Yahoo 10K, Yahoo chiefly challenges other businesses to draw users to its website and promoters to its marketing services. Yahoo expects the market to develop progressively more competitive in the event that online marketing persists to nurture and gain reception on an international basis. Yahoo’

Home Depot CEO Robert Nardelli Severance Pay Case Study

Home Depot CEO Robert Nardelli Severance Pay - Case Study Example On a closer look many factors are behind Robert Nardelli's huge severance package that cannot be traced to Nardelli alone; but there are measures that could be used to done to reign over-the-top CEO compensations such as Nardelli's. According to Alan Sloan, business analyst of Washington Post (Sloan, p. D01), Nardelli is not receiving a severance pay more than he was actually entitled to under the employment contract he signed in 2000 with the board of Home Depot. Ken Langone, one of the founders of Home Depot, continued Sloan was in fact was one of those of people who was involved in negotiating for Nardelli, one of the two GE executives who was one-time candidate to replace famous Jack Welch when he left GE. In the same article, Paul Hodgson, a senior research associate at the Corporate Library which investigates corporate governance said that the trouble started in 2000, and that everything was in Nardelli's contract. ... One of the issues raised by Nardelli's case was how shareholders who are the owners-at-large of a company could be relegated to the sidelines in deciding executive pay packages. This was borne out when Nardelli with an absent board presided alone over the annual stockholders held on May 28, 2006 in which he was criticized for cutting off stockholders' questions over his compensation (NPR, January 6, 2007; Grow par. 8-9). On December 2006, Relational Investors rebuked Home Depot's management and called on a review of the firm's direction and even a possibility of a sale. What came to pass with Nardelli's resignation a month later, with him leaving with a fat severance package even highlighted the need for more power granted to shareholders in deciding what and how much to pay company CEOs. In a report by CNNMoney.com, a proposal filed by one of Home Depot's investors and endorsed by long-time shareholders Laborers' International Union of America (LIUNA) would require the board to get shareholder approval for what was termed as "extraordinary retirement benefits". In other companies such as Sprint, GE, Qwest, Delta and Verizon, investors have filed similar proposals to scale down severance packages according Hodgson in an interview with CNNMoney.com. Home Depot CEO Robert Nardelli Severance Pay Another reason for reducing huge pay packages of huge CEOs is in the interest of wealth equality. National Public Radio reported in an article by Uri Berliner that one of the reasons that the very rich or the top-earning one percent continue to increase their share of the country's wealth (from 8 percent to 16 percent in 2004) was that affluent people own more in stocks. CEOs like

Journal Article1 Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Journal Article1 - Essay Example The OPSCA will eventually lessen the burden on employees who manually monitor the performance of the company; therefore, leaving them more time to work on other important projects that will improve the quality of their healthcare service. Overall, the OPSCA offers health care providers with a system that will efficiently â€Å"track their clinical, financial, administrative and research data†. This news about the introduction of Oracle’s new software is indeed good news to those in the healthcare industry. The article gives its readers an idea on how IT companies are continually developing new software to improve the operating systems in various industries, in this case the healthcare industry. The description of the software as presented by the author is very enlightening and will be understood even by those who are not so much into new technologies. The readers will realize that the OPSCA is something which will be helpful for healthcare providers in making informed decisions as they pursue their business. One is made aware that the software will aid healthcare companies in reducing among others, their procurement expenses; thus, making them more

Influence of Social Networking Sites on Relationships Essay

Influence of Social Networking Sites on Relationships - Essay Example The essay "Influence of Social Networking Sites on Relationships" discusses the influence of social networking sites on relationships. A social networking site is a form of media of the digital age that helps people in the development of communities and networks. Some of the most popular examples include Facebook, Twitter, and Orkut. The system of kinship includes people who have close relationships with each other or those who are living as a unit or family. We create our own definition of family. We can decide to add and not add people depending on whether we trust them or consider them family. In this way, we actually go beyond defining kinship as just blood relationships and add such relationships to the definition that leaves a great impact on our lives. Some people believe that close relationships fall into the definition of kinship whereas some people believe that only a blood relationship is real kinship. Today, anthropology is heading towards forming new forms of kinship. Fo r example, we can find many people on Facebook who have their close friends or childhood friends as their sisters and brothers. On the other hand, many people present on Facebook have blood relationships between each other. Social networking sites, such as Facebook, also helps people in the formation of imagined communities and networks. People can form such communities where there are no boundaries, no nation states, but a place where they can find people with whom they feel good. Facebook has made people less individualistic.

Corporate Power Global Trend to the Fashion Industry in Ethiopia Assignment

Corporate Power Global Trend to the Fashion Industry in Ethiopia - Assignment Example The fashion industry in Ethiopia is growing since it has received significant amounts of corporate investments. The investors, suppliers, and large corporations have been entering the country to take advantage of low costs of productions in terms of land and labor. The large tracts of land are also fertile for the growth of cotton. The stable government encourages investments. Additionally, Ethiopia has a young population that is trainable. However, the textile industry faces some drawbacks such as transport logistics, corporate scandals, and misuse of land and labor laws. The corporate power would continue to influence the fashion industry positively in Ethiopia if companies continued to take advantage of the country’s favorable factors and co-operated to eliminate drawbacks. The textile industry in Ethiopia has come from far and has a potential of soaring to greater heights if the current corporate investments persist. Ethiopia is in Sub-Saharan Africa, a region that experiences a nascent growth in the textile industry compared to the Northern parts of Africa. According to Fassil Tadesse, Kebire Enterprises Chief Executive Officer, Ethiopia textile tradition can be traced back a long way but its development had begun taking roots just a few years ago. A critical analysis shows that Ethiopian textile industry forms part of a wider pattern of the global trade movement. It moved to Japan after beginning in the United States. It advanced to South Korea before crawling to China (Mousavi). The soaring cost of conducting business in China over the last few years has made investors shift to Africa due to low costs in the region. Speaking to the Economist Intelligence Unit, Fossil said fashion development emanates mainly from Turkey, India, China, South Korea, an d Bangladesh.  

The Audit Report and Internal Control Evaluation Essay Example for Free

The Audit Report and Internal Control Evaluation Essay Team D Auditing has been evaluating the evidence presented by Apollo Shoes. The audit team has developed an audit report in response to the audit and has also provided a description of the evidence, a description of the account sampling and testing procedures used, and has also given a brief description of the value of an audit report. This report is only to reflect Team D’s opinion regarding Apollo’s internal controls, financial statements, and management’s assessment. Management Responsibilities We have audited the financial statements of Apollo Shoes Inc. , including the balance sheet, income statement, and statement of cash flows. The company’s management is responsible for preparing these financial statements; in addition, the management is responsible for implementing adequate internal controls to ensure the accuracy and completeness of these statements (Arens, Elder, Beasley, 2012). Our responsibility as an auditor is to conduct an audit in accordance with the Generally Accepted Auditing Standards and express an opinion on these statements based on the audit. Audit Scope The audit conducted by Team D Auditing was executed in accordance with standards set by Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) (Arens et al., 2012). The standards set by these two bodies require the team to arrange and complete an inspection of the evidence to obtain reasonable assurance of whether the company’s financial statements are without material misstatements. Also, the team is to evaluate the internal controls and determine if they provide adequate control over the financial reporting for the material components. The audit includes the examination of the following: Financial Statement Disclosures Evidence that supports reported amounts Internal Controls: Implementation and Current Use Financial Statement Presentation Management-made Estimates Accounting Principle Assessments Report of Independent Registered Public Accounting Firm To the Board of Directors and Shareholders of Apollo Shoes, Inc. Apollo Shoes Audit was conducted under the Public Accounting Oversight Board Standards. Under these standards is required to provide assurance about the financial reporting and the internal control place in operation. In order to achieve assurance the financial statements are evaluated based on an examination of evidence providing basis for our opinion. Our examination included: Significant estimates made by management – evaluate the reasonable of the significant assumptions (Becker CPA Review, 2014). Financial statement presentation evaluate the presentation and format of financial information (Arens et al., 2012). Accounting principle evaluation, corrections of errors involving principle or changing principal not acceptable to an acceptable one† (Arens et al., 2012). Adequate disclosures of significant accounting policies, accounting changes or loss contingency (Becker CPA Review, 2014). Since Apollo Shoes was a public traded company is imperative to test the effectiveness of the internal control, which is based on: Preventive controls that are placed in operation indicating that transactions were valid, recognized, and submitted for processing following the internal control objectives (Becker CPA Review, 2014). Detective controls provide assurance that the errors and regularities are discovered and corrected in the normal course of business (Becker CPA Review, 2014). Our evidence examination should provide assurance that the financial statements are correct in order for us to sustain our opinion. However, it is impossible due to inherent limitations that the internal controls may not prevent or detect material misstatements. As discussed in note 5, based on our finding the sales and account receivables were overstated by $5,765,081.82 and the related cost of goods sold by $3,165, 145.10 (Louwers, 2007). We determined that this sale is not in accordance with general accepted accounting procedures. Based on the evidence and procedures performed as mentioned in the previous paragraph, Team D opinion on Apollo Shoes financial statement for the period ending on December 31, 2007 do not present fairly on all material respect the financial position of the company. However, we are confirming the efficiency and effectiveness of the internal control, based on COSO framework. It is important to mention that Apollo Shoes has a litigation suit in the preliminary stage for $12,000,000, which intend to defend them self. It is reasonable that the loss could reach $10,000,000 after legal fees (Louwers, 2007). No adjustments have been made to the financial statements. Since Apollo has lost his major customer, this has raised a substantial doubt about the ability that Apollo Shoes Inc. can continue as a going concern. The financial statements do not include any adjustment that contemplates this uncertainty. Description of Evidence The evidence used for the audit included several items presented by Apollo Shoes. The team was presented with the SEC 10-K filing from 2006, as well as the minutes from the audit committee meeting. The team also reviewed the company Letter to the Shareholders. The SEC filing provided us with historical financial statements and a wealth of other information about the company, including quarterly unaudited operation results. The team also reviewed the company accounting and control procedures manual to evaluate the controls over the accounting functions of the company, such as accounts receivables and cash management. Team D Auditing also performed an inventory observation, reviewed the sales forecast for the upcoming year, and reviewed the Board Meeting minutes from the meeting June 30, 2007. The team was also able to examine the 2006 audited and the 2007 unaudited trial balances, the work papers for the new computer system and the work papers for the internal control systems. The team was able to perform a thorough audit for Apollo Shoes based upon the evidence presented. Account Sampling The goal of an audit is to ensure the financial statements are fairly presented in accordance to the Generally Accepted Auditing Standards, and to obtain reasonable assurance that the statements are free from material errors. It is impossible and costly to test every transaction; therefore, we will be selecting samples for testing and make inference about the overall effectiveness of these statements. We will use the simple random sampling method to select these samples because this method ensures every item has an equal chance of being included (Arens et al., 2012). In addition, depend on the account we are testing different number of items may be included in each sample. Testing Procedures The auditor used industry data and compared it to Apollo Shoes financial information to comprehend the business and its results to determine if the company financial well-being. The auditor also compared the â€Å"client data with similar prior period data† (Arens et al., 2012, p. 227). This included the following: Comparing the current year with the previous year’s audited balance Examine current and previous year’s trial balance to decipher changes. Compared detail of total balances with previous year’s total balance â€Å"Compare details such as monthly totals of current year and preceding year for sales, repairs, loans payable, and other accounts† noticing significant changes (Arens et al., 2012, p. 227). Compared current ratios and percentages of current and previous years Compare current and previous common-size financial statements with vertical and horizontal analysis; Compare ratios analysis â€Å"solvency, efficiency, and profitability ratios† (Boynton, 2006, p. 325). Compared client prepared information with auditor’s expectations Auditor develops an estimation or expectation of results and account balances and compares it to client’s expectations, results, and account balances examining difference. Examine lead schedules prepared by the client. Audit Report Value The value of an audit report is quite simple. It is the written representation of the auditor’s opinion and acts of an almost guarantee for company investors, creditors, and clients. The audit report lists the auditor and director responsibility, gives the scope of the audit, and reports the auditor’s opinion. It lets the users of the financial statements know that they can be reasonably assured statements are without material misstatement and can use the contained information to make their decisions. Of course, the opinion given is not completely guaranteed. Conclusion Team D Auditing carefully considered the given evidence and performed tests of the internal controls and has come to the conclusion that we are unable to provide reasonable assurance that the financial statements are without material misstatement. We are also concerned with the future of Apollo Shoes with the loss of its biggest client and the pending lawsuit. The audit report, including some additional information regarding the evidence, sampling, and testing procedures have been submitted for review. References Arens, A. A., Elder, R. J., Beasley, M. S. (2012). Auditing and assurance services: An integrated approach (14th ed.). New York, NY: Pearson/Prentice Hall Becker Professional Education/CPA Review (2014) Audit Reports; Devry/Becker Educational Development Corp Boynton, W. C. (2006). Modern Auditing (8th ed.). Danvers, MA: John Wiley Sons, Inc. Louwers, T. R. (2007). Apollo Shoes, InC. Auditing and Assurance Services. McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.