EMERGING NETWORKTECHNOLOGIESASSIGNMENT 1

MOUSSAVOU MANFOUMBIAREL LOIS11037955

&ITUMELENG MOTLOLISI

11027638DINM3

Question 1

Use the guidelines offered above and discuss Cloud computing and associated technologies.

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing as a service rather than a product, whereby shared resources, software, and information are provided to computers and other devices as a utility (like the electricity grid) over a network (typically theInternet). Clouds can be classified as public, private or hybrid.

Evaluate the emerging technology in the context of business processes, in other words discuss the influence cloud computing on the businessprocessesImpact 1: The importance of the customer experience

Cloud will escalate the importance of delivering effective service—thequality of the customer experience—as a differentiator of suppliers inthe external IT and business services industry. That, in turn, will

change the character of the technology supply industry. As customers become more savvy, their expectations are rising—meaning that IT and business services must raise their level of service competency, adopting a 24/7 focus on availability, security and quality.

In this competitive environment, a customer’s service experience will be one of the keys to success, yet few cloud companies are currently focused on the metrics that could enable them to assess their service capabilities and improve them. Quantity, performance, value and quality are the four most important metrics. However, “softer” metrics—characteristics such as responsiveness, assurance and empathy—will become increasingly important in the new business and IT environment.

What matters with the cloud is not just what the service organization does but what the customer actually experiences and that increases theimportance of delivering on a service quality promise. A CEO we interviewed put the matter succinctly: “I am moving to only two sets of metrics: customer satisfaction and key business performance indicators.”

Impact 2: The shift from products to services

The second long-term impact of cloud computing involves the shift fromIT-based products to business-oriented services. Although this trend has been present for some time, cloud computing is dramatically accelerating the shift. So we see an increasing presence of services such as Microsoft’s Office 365: instead of needing to buy and maintainsoftware for every PC in the organization, companies now have access to always-updated office software through the cloud.

Another example comes from Qantas Airways, which replaced its 22-year-old Fortran-based system with a cloud-based computing platform for itsFrequent Flyer program. The cloud has given the airline a scalable architecture that can cope more effectively with rapid changes in demand, providing more consistent service to its 7 million members while also dealing with rapidly growing activity. Qantas also sees thenew platform as providing the opportunity to target loyalty promotionsand extend its loyalty program by introducing new partners—something that would have been difficult with the older system.

How fast the cloud accelerates this trend toward IT-based services depends on two things. The first is the degree to which clients and suppliers can work together to identify the new business service possibilities created by the imaginative deployment of cloud-based technologies, and then delivers on them. The second factor is the roleof service integrators in configuring hardware, software, cloud capabilities and cloud suppliers into new value propositions—simplifying, standardizing and commoditizing technology and supplier complexity into offerings that can be experienced as relatively straightforward business services.

Impact 3: Reconfiguration of the supply industry

How will the cloud computing model affect the traditional IT and business process outsourcing industry? Far from the cloud being a harbinger of the “death of outsourcing,” we expect a significant increase in the use of external service provision, resulting in a muchsmaller internal IT function.

This scenario is based on the likelihood of an increasingly diverse and dynamic supplier community, organized along three principal value trajectories to manage different levels of complexity:

A relatively small group of bulk providers of utility and platform services such as storage, processing and email. In accord with the utility metaphor, these compa¬nies will be akin to power stations, supplying the raw computing power for most enterprise applications as well as the ability to scale up or down as needed.

A much larger group of specialist providers with distinctive industry expertise (such as banking, manufacturing and retail) orfunctional skills such as HR, sales and CRM. As they become more sophisticated, these companies will move beyond today’s software-as-a-service capabilities to provide entire business processes asa service.

A more elite group of service integrators with deep consulting and technology skills that will partner with enterprises to design, manage and continuously optimize the comprehensive services ecosystem.

Evaluate the risks associated with adopting cloud computingChallenge #1: Safeguarding data security

The cloud carries some new risks, however— People hack brands or hack applications regardless of what the infrastructure are underneath. Because a cloud provider hosts multiple clients, each can be affected by actions taken against any one of them, as in distributed denial-of-service attacks—server requests that inundate a provider from widely distributed computers. This is what happened, for example, in the wakeof the WikiLeaks activities: when attacks came into the provider hosting WikiLeaks, all other clients were affected as well.

However, some of these risks are mitigated to a degree by new securityapplications such as encrypted file systems and data-loss prevention software. Cloud providers also have the ability to invest in more sophisticated security hardware and software, such as using analytics to examine unusual behavior across vast numbers of virtual servers. Beyond this, a provider’s scale enables effective responses to large-scale server attacks through high levels of redundancy.

Concerned enterprises can also mitigate risk by employing hybrid clouds—a situation in which most servers are in the cloud, but key data is hosted internally—and by improving data governance.

Challenge #2: Managing the contractual relationship

Cloud computing contracts are a mix of outsourcing, software and leasing. Some observers have argued that contracting for cloud is simpler than traditional approaches to IT sourcing because only one contract is required instead of multiple agreements for software, hardware and systems integration. In reality, however, few software, platform or infrastructure providers meet all of a client’s functionalrequirements, so contracting for cloud services typically involves ecosystems of providers that must be integrated to provide complete solutions.

Cloud contracts generally focus on service-level agreement (SLA) guarantees, but the network of interactions within the overall ecosystem increases the complexity of SLAs. Software-as-a-service providers, for example, often share a single platform for all users, and so they cannot provide each client with a differentiated SLA. At present, relatively low compensation is offered by providers for breaches of SLAs, but competition should improve this situation, as should the development of cloud standards.

Our research also found that cloud providers are currently not adequately focused on providing enterprise contracting requirements. As one respondent told us, “The problem with cloud services today is that many of the service providers have not evolved to the point that they are comfortable being custodians of data.” That is, many providers have historical roots in product development, not service provision, so they often do not adequately understand what it means tohave service liability.

In response, companies should evaluate cloud SLAs in relation to theircompany’s risk management profile and the ecosystem of cloud providers. When the offered SLAs are insufficient, companies can seek to exploit multiple cloud providers for the same service. In this way they can fashion their own guaranteed uptime by creating virtual points of presence at extremely low cost. Also, companies can engage aservice integrator to perform management and contractual functions.

Challenge #3: Dealing with lock-in

Exit strategies and lock-in risks are key concerns for companies looking to exploit cloud computing. There is always a switching cost for any company receiving external services. However, cloud providers have a significant additional incentive to attempt to exploit lock-in.If computing were to become a very liquid commodity, and if switching to a lower-cost provider were too easy, margins would rapidly become razor thin.

When contracting for a cloud service, executives should be aware of two forms of lock-in. The first form, technology lock-in, concerns thecost of moving a business service from one cloud platform to another.

Once a company is on a particular platform, it is often more cost-effective to purchase additional services compatible with existing ones—thus increasing lock-in. A second form, institutional lock-in, occurs when technologies become embedded within organizational routines and users’ work practices. Particularly for users of software-as-a-service, such institutionalism can have a serious impacton the ability to switch cloud providers--which increases the severityof lock-in.

Providers are likely to focus on increasing lock-in as competition reduces margins. Competitors, however, will focus on reducing switching costs for dominant players. Specialist services and service integrators can help meet these challenges.

Challenge #4: Managing the cloud

Although many dramatic predictions are being made about the impact of cloud computing—among them, the claim that traditional IT departments will become obsolete—our research supports the conclusion that cloud impacts are likely to be more gradual and less linear. Nevertheless, the cloud does carry with it significant disruption to business as usual, leading to two particular management challenges.

First, once introduced into the enterprise, cloud services can be easily updated or changed by business users without the direct involvement of the IT department. And it is in the provider’s interests to develop functionality that expands usage and spreads it across the organization. So maintaining overall, strategic control of services can be difficult. This independence of the business when it comes to IT services also means that IT must work harder to gain the ongoing attention of the C-suite and to extend its strategic role.

Second, organizations are still slow in developing management capabilities and principles for operating with cloud services. Such strategies should focus on the multiple contracts needed for a cloud ecosystem. Effective supervision of usage, SLAs, performance, robustness and business dependency is vital. Monitoring the external provider’s services must be done, but internal cloud monitoring shouldalso be introduced. Support provided by cloud providers can be

variable, and organizations should develop their own support services,either internally or with third parties

Develop strategies to adopt anddeploy cloud computing successfullyCloud Deployments Models In the cloud deployment model, networking, platform, storage, and software infrastructure are provided as services that scale up or down depending on the demand. The Cloud Computing model has three main deployment models which are:

Private cloud Private cloud is a new term that some vendors have recently used to describe offerings that emulate cloud computing on private networks. It is set up within an organization’s internal enterprise datacenter. In the private cloud, scalable resources and virtual applications provided by the cloud vendor are pooled together and available for cloud users to share and use. It differs from the public cloud in that all the cloud resources and applications are managed by the organization itself, similar to Intranet functionality. Utilization on the private cloud can be much more secure than that of the public cloud because of its specified internal exposure. Only the organization and designated stakeholders may have access to operate on a specific Private cloud.

Public cloud Public cloud describes cloud computing in the traditional mainstream sense, whereby resources are dynamically provisioned on a fine-grained, self-service basis over the Internet, via web applications/web services, from an off-site third-party provider who shares resources and bills on a fine-grained utility computing basis. It is typically based on a pay-per-use model, similar to a prepaid electricity metering system which is flexible enough to cater for spikes in demand for cloud optimization. Public clouds are less secure than the other cloud models because it places an additional burden of ensuring all

applications and data accessed on the public cloud are not subjected to malicious attacks.

Hybrid cloud Hybrid cloud is a private cloud linked to one or more external cloud services, centrally managed, provisioned as asingle unit, and circumscribed by a secure network. It provides virtual IT solutions through a mix of both public and private clouds. Hybrid Cloud provides more secure control of the data andapplications and allows various parties to access information over the Internet. It also has an open architecture that allows interfaces with other management systems. Hybrid cloud can describe configuration combining a local device, such as a Plug computer with cloud services. It can also describe configurationscombining virtual and physical, collocated assets -for example, amostly virtualized environment that requires physical servers, routers, or other hardware such as a network appliance acting as a firewall or spam filter

Relate any Artificial Intelligence (AI) to cloud computingHow can Cloud Computing improve AISince Cloud Computing emphasizes that all the data as well as the programs running are stored somewhere in a cloud, this means that a large amount of data can be used for analysis and use by AI programs in order to perform data mining or other AI-related techniques to deduce useful information.

For example, consider the WordPress.com application, in which you haveyour own capacity to store on it what you need of posts and multimedia. If the data and the behavior of users – such as you – weren’t all stored in the cloud of WordPress.com, not enough data willbe available to be used for AI purposes

Conclusion about the cloud computing and its valueConclusion: Becoming a cloud corporation

At its highest level of impact, cloud computing is ushering in an era in which enterprises themselves will become virtual. Corporations willmanage complex ecosystems of cloud providers, IT suppliers and business process outsourcers as well as a host of other parties, both internal and external.

This is another reason why the ability to provide innovation, and not just cost reductions, will be critical to competitive differentiation in the IT and business services industry. Customers are becoming much more ambitious about wanting not only IT operational benefits from thecloud, but also business process and market innovations. These will only be possible by tapping more effectively into brain power, wherever it exists in the supplier and solutions ecosystem.

Question 2

Use the guidelines offered above and discuss Social media and associated technologies.

Social media is the social interaction among people in which theycreate, share or exchange information and ideas in virtual communities and networks. Social media depend on mobile and web-based technologies to create highly interactive platforms throughwhich individuals and communities share, co-create, discuss, and modify user-generated content. They introduce substantial and pervasive changes to communication between organizations, communities, and individuals. Diagram depicting the many different types of social media

Social media differ from traditional or industrial media in many ways,including quality, reach, frequency, usability, immediacy, and permanence. There are many effects that stem from internet usage. According to Nielsen, internet users continue to spend more time with social media sites than any other type of site.

Evaluate the emerging technology in the context of business processes, in other words discuss the influence of social media on the business processesSocial Media has changed the way businesses professionals (customers, partners, prospects, and employees). Use social media as a platform for Discussion of ideas, experiences, and knowledge-exchange. As we enter the era of business-to-person (B2P) customer relationship systems, those organizations that harness Web 2.0 technologies and SMPG platforms to enable B2P Communications will be the winners. Laggards who do not understand the value of social networking and its appeal to the emotional side of customer relationship management will lose Competitiveness and, ultimately, market share. Perhaps most importantly, they will lose the ability to

connect and learn from their customers. Professional networks and business-focused online communities are becoming the new strategic mandate. Effective customer relationships are the core to any successful organization, and the strength of any organization is largely dependent upon the company’s ability to deliver the right products and services to its customers in a timely way. Knowing what customers want and understanding their current and future needs is paramount to increasing revenue and exceeding customer expectations. Online communities provide a prime opportunity for organizations to get to know their customers more intimately and keep the finger on thepulse of their needs and behaviors. The time is now for companies to embrace communities to help them serve their clients better, faster and in more cost-efficient ways. Through the use of online professional networks, companies now have an opportunity to forge a dialogue with their customers actively throughout the lifecycle—not just at the point of sale—to learn what they like and don’t like abouta product or service.

Evaluate the risks associated with adopting on social mediaa) Reputational:

If the organization is regarded as innovative, but opts not to use social media, it may change the perception of key stakeholders, including staff, customers and suppliers. Without using social media, there is a strong argument that it will become increasingly more difficult for some organizations to fully engage with all their stakeholders and that they will also miss opportunities to raise brandawareness.

b) Financial:

A major attraction for many is that the use of social media is, essentially, free. Therefore, organizations must avoid investing in expensive technology that may simply replicate what social media does.

Furthermore, by not using social media, the organization may spend a significant amount, in terms of time and actual cost, by opting for face-to-face interaction. Use of social media reduces such costs.

c) Strategic:

There are two main strategic threats: firstly, the failure to drive innovation and creativity within the organization itself and also within its related communities. This can lead to an organization becoming moribund and / or that others (i.e. competitors) step in to fill that void.

Secondly - and one that is potentially very damaging - is that non-useof social media will lead to an inability to improve efficiency of learning and teaching and of research work.

d) Operational:

Organizations not using social media will be unable to access current relevant information or they will have to pay for this from other sources. In parallel, they will find themselves continuing to use costly traditional methods to conduct learning and teaching and research work.

Develop strategies to adopt anddeploy social media successfully

I suggest that companies should use the following roadmap when deploying social media internally1. Identify leaders who are authentic and who employees trust.

2. Help those people develop social media skills.

3. Ask them to build social media communities that emphasize authenticity, pride, attachment and fun. In short, build emotional capital.

4. Deploy social media tools sequentially. Start with wikis and podcasts, and roll out social networking only after enough emotional capital has been built. (Our survey found that ease of communication inside a company actually declined when an organization introduced social networking that did not increase emotional capital. Internal communication improved only when organizations introduced social medianetworking that increased emotional capital. See “What Our Survey Found.”)

5. Expect instrumental benefits (such as improved information exchange, motivation, morale, reduced turnover) only after emotional capital has been developed in these communities. Obviously, actions that are appreciated as authentic and that help others experience pride, attachment or fun can be highly contextual and culturally dependent. Executives from different cultures should use locally appropriate means to develop these four pillars of emotional capital.

Strategies used to adapt to social media 1. Executive Sponsorship - people need to understand that there is a strong expectation that they will engage in the new system, in which the company has invested a lot of money and from which the company expects to derive significant value. Ideally, strategies needs to be transparent and all inclusive to ensure various business units may participate effectively.

2. Process Transition - Sales leaders, line managers and team leaders need to mandate certain processes that will only be conducted within the company. Rather than being arbitrary, this should begin with the kind of processes and functions at which company excel - for instance real time discussion and question-answering during open discussion forums, broadcasting and access to critical health and safety information, as well as training and onboarding participation. Ultimately, success is ensured by moving less productive processes to the social and collaborative environment where the business can both see and feel the improvements as adoption evolves.

3. Incentives - is a proven way to ensure adoption, particularly if made suitably competitive by prizes or “badges”. are very good at not

only tracking usage but ranking it and so monthly awards can be given for the most comments, likes or shares on the company .

4. Training - one of the most important and often overlooked aspects to driving adoption is employee training and demonstrations. Budget and time should be invested in training users before, during and afterdeployment to ensure they have been given sufficient access to - and guidance in - the product. In most cases, mirror more popular Social Networks like LinkedIn and Google+ and so traction should follow quickly from initial hands-on introduction.

5. Culture - it is always easier to go with the grain of company culture rather than against it. Company culture should be analyzed andincorporated into the rollout plan and strategies should be designed to adapt the company to the culture rather than the other way around. Selecting certain activities that define the culture and migrating them into the business will mean that the new platform becomes a familiar environment for workers rather than an alien one.

Relate any Artificial Intelligence (AI) social media SoDash is a social media dashboard for brands and organisations to monitor and interact with the market. The reason it is unique owes to its artificial intelligence algorithms that learn what is important toyour business through tagging. Once trained, it will automatically tagmessages that are sales leads, positive or negative comments about your brand or competitors, deliver market information, ghost write andsend responses and much more. Whilst some tools out there are good formonitoring social media, SoDash enables you to take control of social media and make it work for you with minimal resources

Conclusion about social media and its value

Recommendation is to block any third-party app access to your account,in case of it being compromised. This would assure that a hacker is unable to access the account from any other entry point. Third-party app access should only be allowed from a trusted and well secured siteand shouldn't be practiced for any other purpose. Social privacy has become a serious concern for different social media platforms as they are experiencing a number of hack attempts and some of which have cracked the security boundaries successfully.

Also, as more and more businesses are relying on social media for business presence, it becomes a responsibility of social networks to safeguard the reputation of these businesses by imparting high level of security to each user. These issues ask for more attentive and preventive measures to be deployed because once the damage is done, itbecomes impossible for businesses to get over it.

Question 3

Use the guidelines offered above and discuss mobile applications and associated technologies.

It is a term used to describe Internet applications that run on smartphones and other mobile devices. Mobile applications usuallyhelp users by connecting them to Internet services more commonly accessed on desktop or notebook computers, or help them by makingit easier to use the Internet on their portable devices. A mobileapp may be a mobile Web site bookmarking utility, a mobile-based instant messaging client, Gmail for mobile, and many other applications.

Evaluate the emerging technology in the context of business processes, in other words discuss the influence of mobile applications on the business processesAll technology has the capacity to innovate in business, how it integrates with business process and what the influence it has in the business is matters. Technology is to amplify potential gains to reduce costs, turn down risks and hasten business growth. For the recent years you can see the technology takes on the central role in every business processes. Technology is not just support for any business, it’s also adding power to your business.

A wireless workforce will build you a new business transition betweenclients and customers. One of the next big social revolutions is mobile communication with new services to help companies accelerate better business outcomes. Mobilizing your enterprise will bring you new potential clients to the company which will accelerate your business growth. To build a consumer oriented empire and beat the competition with new service, emerging new technologies is need to give people the true experience of being connected with content from anywhere and anytime.

Evaluate the risks associated with adopting to mobile applications

The Mobile App Top 10 ListThere are 2 main categories of mobile app risks. The category of Malicious Functionality is a list of unwanted and dangerous behaviors that are stealthily placed in a Trojan app that the user is tricked into installing. The user thinks they are installing a game or utilityand instead get hidden spyware, phishing UI, or unauthorized premium dialing.

A. Malicious Functionality 1. Activity monitoring and data retrieval

2. Unauthorized dialing, SMS, and payments

3. Unauthorized network connectivity (exfiltration or command & control)

4. UI Impersonation

5. System modification (rootkit, APN proxy config)

6. Logic or Time bomb

The category of Vulnerabilities is errors in design or implementation that expose the mobile device data to interception and retrieval by attackers. Vulnerabilities can also expose the mobile device or the cloud applications used from the device to unauthorized access.

B. Vulnerabilities 7. Sensitive data leakage (inadvertent or side channel)

8. Unsafe sensitive data storage

9. Unsafe sensitive data transmission

10. Hardcoded password/keys

Develop strategies to adopt anddeploy mobile applications successfully

Deliver Apps that Keep Employees Productive Mobile applications are changing the way your employees work. Today’smobile users demand mobile applications that connect them to enterprise resources, increase their productivity and promote collaboration with colleagues. Smart enterprises empower their employees with company-approved public and custom-built internal applications.

AirWatch® Mobile Application Management addresses the challenge of acquiring, distributing, securing and tracking mobile applications. Easily manage internal, public and purchased apps across employee-owned, corporate-owned and shared devices from one central console.

Lifecycle Management AirWatch enables organizations to manage applications throughout the entire app lifecycle from purchasing and developing to securing, distributing and tracking installation. Administrators are able to view available and installed public and internal applications, versions and more from the central admin console.

Purchase and Develop Applications AirWatch integrates with public app stores such as the Apple App Store, Microsoft Store and Google Play store to allow access to publicapps in the AirWatch App Catalog. Control app costs by setting cost control policies and designating apps as reimbursable or non-

reimbursable in the App Catalog. AirWatch integration with the Apple Volume Purchase Program (VPP) allows you purchase apps, iBooks and custom B2B apps in bulk and easily manage your licenses. For organizations building custom internal applications, AirWatch offers our Software Development Kit (SDK) and App Wrapping.

Distribution and AirWatch App Catalog AirWatch enables administrators to push applications automatically when users enroll and to make applications available for on-demand installation in the AirWatch App Catalog. Integrate the App Catalog with MDM, deploy within the AirWatch Workspace or utilize as a stand-alone app. In the App Catalog, users can view, browse, search and install public, internal, recommended and web applications. The custom-brandable App Catalog supports multiple languages and an easy-to-use HTML5 interface. Integration with third-party file shares enables you to create custom categories and highlight featured applications. AirWatch enables you to create “smart groups” to assign different apps and settings for different users or roles. Administrators can push required apps automatically during enrollment and manage them remotely

App Security AirWatch gives administrators ultimate application security with the ability to create app whitelists and blacklists, configure compliance policies and restrict native applications. Prevent data loss with features like user authentication, data encryption, data backup restrictions and compliance tracking. AirWatch also enables reputationanalysis for both internal and public apps. Run analysis on discoveredapps, assign risk profiles, define security requirements and automatically enforce compliance.

Feedback and Ratings With AirWatch, end users can rate and review both public and internalapplications. Comments and ratings are visible to other users and administrators in the App Catalog. If an application crashes, AirWatch

captures the crash log and automatically sends it to app developers for detailed diagnostics (AirWatch SDK

Admin Control and TrackingAirWatch enables intuitive app management with advanced administrativecontrol features. Leverage AirWatch multitenancy to delegate app management to different administrators and ensure employees only have access to the apps they need with role-based access control. View app inventory, versions, status, ratings and more, plus how many users have installed an app versus how many were assigned the app. Enable single-click app installation and removal from the console. Administrators can track applications and data in AirWatch, including description, number of users assigned an app, workflow status, Terms of Use acceptance history and more.

Relate any Artificial Intelligence (AI) to mobile applicationsThe emergence of mobile apps has provided us with a new, more personallevel of virtual assistance--you can pay your bills and set reminders via your mobile banking app and shop via a branded retail app. Therefore, apps are already moving us toward expecting our machines toperform more simplistic--yet also more specific--tasks on command.

AI is taking this much further. Simply put, AI, when integrated into today's devices, can perform human-like tasks that allow devices to learn, analyze, optimize, diagnose, configure and deliver your personal data in the form of customized solutions.

Conclusion about the mobile applications and its value

Today, when you use a recommendation or advice-based technology on your mobile device, it's often based on aggregated behavior. But, referencing a different individual's behavior for your actions isn't necessarily very accurate or helpful. In our modern life, we will increasingly expect and require granular insights into our daily livesto help us be more productive and efficient.

Question 4 Use the guidelines offered above and discuss security and associated technologies. Keep in mind the security features discussed here may link back tothe previously mentioned emerging technologies.

Security and cloud computingIn the last few years, cloud computing has grown from being a promising business concept to one of the fastest growing segments of the IT industry. Now, recession-hit companies are increasingly realising that simply by tapping into the cloud they can gain fast access to best-of-breed business applications or drastically boost their infrastructure resources, all at negligible cost. But as more and more information on individuals and companies is placed in the cloud, concerns are beginning to grow about just how safe an environment it is.

Every breached security system was once thought infallible

SaaS (software as a service) and PaaS (platform as a service) providers all trumpet the robustness of their systems, often claiming that security in the cloud is tighter than in most enterprises. But the simple fact is that every security system that has ever been breached was once thought infallible.

Understand the risks of cloud computing

Cloud service users need to be vigilant in understanding the risks of data breaches in this new environment.

"At the heart of cloud infrastructure is this idea of multi-tenancy and decoupling between specific hardware resources and applications," explains Datamonitor senior analyst Vuk Trifković. "In the jungle of multi-tenant data, you need to trust the cloud provider that your information will not be exposed." For their part, companies need to bevigilant, for instance about how passwords are assigned, protected andchanged. Cloud service providers typically work with numbers of third parties, and customers are advised to gain information about those companies which could potentially access their data.

● How cloud hosting companies have approached security

As with most SaaS offerings, the applications forming SmartClear's offering are constantly being tweaked and revised, a fact which raisesmore security issues for customers. Companies need to know, for instance, whether a software change might actually alter its security settings

Best practice for companies in the cloud

1. Inquire about exception monitoring systems

2. Be vigilant around updates and making sure that staff don't suddenly gain access privileges they're not supposed to.

3. Ask where the data is kept and inquire as to the details of data protection laws in the relevant jurisdictions.

4. Seek an independent security audit of the host

5. Find out which third parties the company deals with and whether they are able to access your data

Security and Social Media

What are the security and privacy issues associated with social networking sites?

Social networking sites have become very popular avenues for people tocommunicate with family, friends and colleagues from around the corneror across the globe. While there can be benefits from the collaborative, distributed approaches promoted by responsible use of social networking sites, there are information security and privacy concerns. The volume and accessibility of personal information available on social networking sites have attracted malicious people who seek to exploit this information. The same technologies that invite user participation also make the sites easier to infect with malware that can shut down an organization's networks, or keystroke loggers that can steal credentials. Common social networking risks such as spear phishing, social engineering, spoofing, and web application attacks attempt to steal a person's identity. Such attacksare often successful due to the assumption of being in a trusting environment social networks create.

Security and privacy related to social networking sites are fundamentally behavioral issues, not technology issues. The more information a person posts, the more information becomes available fora potential compromise by those with malicious intentions. People who provide private, sensitive or confidential information about themselves or other people, whether wittingly or unwittingly, pose a higher risk to themselves and others.

What are the precautions you should take?● Ensure that any computer you use to connect to a social

media site has proper security measures in place. Use and maintain anti-virus software and keep your application and operating system patches up-to-date.

● Use caution when clicking a link to another page or running an online application, even if it is from someone you know. Many applications embedded within social networking sites require you to share your information when you use them. Attackers use these sites to distribute their malware.

● Use strong and unique passwords. Using the same password on all accounts increases the vulnerability of these accounts if one becomes compromised.

● If screen names are allowed, do not choose one that gives away too much personal information.

Security and Mobile AppPassword protection and application security are high on the list of security concerns as more organizations move to mobile first and BringYour Own Device (BYOD) strategies.

Improving password protection over mobile devices● Require employees to create passwords that are at least 10

characters in length and to use the widest character set possible, including alphabetic (upper and lower case), numeric, and special characters (punctuation)

● Mandate that employee passwords not include words or names, because anything that can be found in a dictionary can be cracked in minutes (even when the word is part of the password -- like “James123” -- it's easily discovered with modern computing power

best practices for passwords on employee mobile devices:

● Limit the amount of time an employees’ password can exist

● Require users to have different passwords on different devices, accounts, or systems

● Create and enforce a corporate policy that sanctions employees for sharing their passwords with others

best practices for governing passwords:● Encourage employees to have device-level passcodes. Even if

this is for personal benefit and not mandated by IT, employees should have some protection for the personal information on their devices. On some operating systems, creating a passcode also enables encryption.

● Require a passcode to access corporate information, such as corporate e-mail and documents. These passcodes can be more complex than the basic four-digit pin at the device level.

● Enforce advanced passwords when accessing very important information. If an employee is accessing a network resource,like SharePoint or their network folder to access a Word document, you should prompt them for their Active Directory credentials. This goes beyond the security level of a four-digit pin

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