Retail business crime

Introduction

Organized Retail business Crimes have been on the rise in both United States and Canada. Organized retail crimes are premeditated crimes committed by sophisticated criminal gangs. It is more sophisticated than common shoplifting where criminals often go in with a shopping list of items. The items are later resold to further other criminal activities. Pricier commodities that can easily be concealed are often the target of retail business crimes. Criminals may take orders from people before engaging in the activity and later resell the items for as low as half the price. Organized retail crime is a multi-million dollar industry in with a huge impact on business owners and consumers. This type of crime has increased considerably over the past few years and is now conducted on daily basis. Two or more individuals conspire to steal large volumes of product with the full intent to illegally re-introducing it into the marketplace by auctioning through online sites, directly selling it to consumers through different avenues such as flea markets, bars, or back of cars or moving them straight across in a drug deal. The sole purpose of organized retail crimes is to generate revenue.

Mac’s Organized Retail Crimes

On December 2014, Mac stores in Parry Sound became a target to organized retail business crime. The company’s bland Toronto office acts as the surveillance room for 560 Mac’s stores in Canada. The office receives live video streams randomly from all its locations.  According to recorded clips at the security and loss prevention store chain in central Canada, on this day, slim woman in a sweater, head scarf, and floor-length skirt sneaked into the back room. The store’s walk-in safe was open, and the woman headed straight for it. She stuffed merchandise beneath her skirt where laundry-sized bags were concealed. The bags are held using a belt around the waist. After stuffing the bags to capacity, her skirt has ballooned out.  She steps out of the backroom and is engulfed by accomplices to shield her from clerks on the way out.  Two or more gang members distract clerks at the counter enquiring about products hanging on the wall behind her. The gang members then make a small purchase before leaving. On sensing foul play, the clerk gets into the back room to replay surveillance tape before calling the police. In the single crime, the store lost $30,000 worth of products within five minutes (Mac’s, 2015).

Mac’s Organized Retail Crimes demonstrates how things have immensely changed in the recent past. Organized retail crimes were not as rampant a decade ago.  Earlier there were many cases of opportunistic theft as compared to very organized gangs.  Criminal gangs employ a variety of techniques, but most of them have an element of distraction. They also utilize particular lined bags to defeat store security alarms.  Some use costumes, props, including wheelchairs.  They also use tricks like walking out the door beside individuals who appears unimpeachably honest.  In the case an alarm goes off, the honest customer stops while the criminal keeps moving forward, into a busy crowd or a waiting car(Mac’s, 2015).

The gang at Mac’s in Parry Sound carried two fake babies echoing other incidents of shoplifting.  Gangs are mobile and employ similar tactics before changing. They may have the same suspect working in one city while others carry out their activities in different cities. With mobile phones, rental cars and fraudulent credit cards and identification, crimes get multi-layered.  As they advance, they become more sophisticated with time.  The stolen goods are sold at warehouse sales, pop-up events, low-income malls and flea markets in neighborhoods where residents are busy to ask too many questions regarding the low prices.  Stolen merchandise may show up mixed among legitimate goods at discount stores or convenience stores owned by unscrupulous vendors (Mac’s, 2015).

Nature of organized retail crimes

Organized retail crimes are different from the traditional forms of shoplifting that most retailers encountered. Although the techniques used are the same, the scale, losses, and frequency of each crime are significantly greater. Unlike the shoplifter, organized retail crimes involve a network of well-trained participants whose sole purpose is to shoplift large quantities for profit. They rely on expertise, experience and well-planned execution to hit retail stores quickly while stealing as much merchandise as possible. The merchandise can be shipped overseas or placed on black markets and resold to traders who believe they are discount priced goods. The reach of organized retail crimes can be global extending beyond a single country's border.  The crime groups are created with a well-established set of connections with different individuals assuming different roles and responsibilities. In the United States, various identified groups have networks in Asia, South and Central America, North America and Russia. Regardless of sizes, organized retail crimes groups are well trained, well networked and well equipped. Roles and responsibilities extend up and down the organizations from actual thieves, sales personnel, and diverters and to the organizers. The last group gets the merchandise back to the market. While members are well educated and trained in their contact, roles and knowledge, contact with members of the network is minimized, either by nature or design making it challenging for law enforcement to break up an entire network (Bamfield, 2012).

How Organized Retail Crime Works

Different organized retail crime carry out their activities with adequate information at hand. They often rely on insiders often an employee, to help them conduct their activities.  The details of how different organized retail criminals operate could be surprisingly sophisticated and complex. The complexity forces management and loss prevention personnel to implement strict measures to keep criminals away. With the introduction of self-checkouts, honest individuals ensure that they ring in all their items. Complacency among honest employees is a great aid to retail thieves and large bar to effective loss prevention. Due to such instances, employees manning self-checkout lanes are required to be doubly vigilant. Retail stores and discount stores consider switching out employees regularly as a preventive measure. Organized retail theft gangs also target business data including banking information and customers' credit.  Despite widely available security precautions, individuals with credit card scanners have the ability to pickpocket sensitive data even when cards are safely tucked away in purses and wallets (Bamfield, 2012).

Employees with ready access to such type of data can easily obtain the necessary information and use it to defraud customers through organized retail gangs.  Due to this, sensitive data has become potentially expensive and most worrisome organized retail theft scam today. Sophisticated organized retail crime gangs may employ a variety of techniques over a period of time.  Well-organized and efficient retail crime groups can have a significant impact on a business and the bottom line. Organized retail gangs also target truckloads of merchandise in addition to targeting stores. They also commit a variety of other frauds such as using cloned or stolen credit cards to obtain merchandise. They also return stolen merchandise to obtain cash or gift cards or change bar codes to pay lower prices. The complexity of operations makes organized retail crimes clearly distinct from ordinary shoplifting carried out by persons seeking goods for personal use (Roberts, 2015).

Cost of organized retail crimes

Organized retail crimes costs retailers approximately nearly $30 billion a year. According to a survey conducted by National Retail Federation, the majority of retailers surveyed in 2014 were victims of organized retail crimes in the previous one year.  They also recognized the increase in the number of incidents over the past year. The average cost of one case was approximately $2.8 million. The exact monetary effect of organized retail crime within the retail industry is still undetermined. However, increased numbers of retailers confirm an increase in incidents of organized retail crimes.  Various studies and surveys show considerable losses that result from organized retail crimes. Although challenging to place an industry-wide value on the costs or retail crimes, the numbers support the argument that growing problem exists. Organized retail crimes are also safety threats to retail workers, with several of the cases involving some level of violence (Roberts, 2015).

The losses increase costs for retailers and, as a result, prices for consumers. They may also create health risk with theft and re-sale of items like baby formula and non-prescription drugs which might be sold after expiration or stored improperly.  Organized retail crimes are often gateway crimes with those apprehended also involved in illegal weapons or drug trade.  Retail Industry Leader's Association (RILA) and National Retail Federation (NRF) are two retail support organizations that have developed a national database to enable law enforcement and retailers to help identify organized rings, analyze possible patterns and track incidents. These efforts in collaboration with individual retailers have helped in raising the level of commitment and support by the law enforcement and legislative communities. While there is evidence of increased support, the individual retailers have intensified their efforts at preventing and protecting to reduce organized retail crime (Roberts, 2015)

Many larger retailers, who have recorded large losses as a result of organized criminal crimes, have developed specific loss prevention mechanisms to prevent significant losses. Wal-Mart is one of the retailers that implemented a facial recognition system to scan the faces of everyone entering its stores. The system identified suspected shoplifters and instantly alerted store security through mobile devices. The potential the technology had been discussed for years. Wal-Mart’s experiment highlighted some of the most effective high-tech tools available to retailers to minimize losses.  Wal-Mart is one of the companies that acknowledge using the software. The retailer later discontinued its use due to low returns on investment (Kopun, 2014)   

A large number of organized retail crime incidents suggest it’s prevalent in department stores and large specialty stores.  The most important factors that gangs take into consideration include merchandise type, store location, loss prevention measures and resell value. It prudent to that assumes that victimizations depend on these retail business factors. The location of the business also plays a major role in it becoming a target. While store locations do not automatically mean that the business is susceptible to retail crimes, risk assessment analysis shows that certain geographic retail locations experience more incidents of crime compared to others.  Resale Value and Merchandise Type is considered a fundamental factor in a retailer's target potential. Retail crime groups are familiar with consumer trends and demands and target those merchandises that they can turn over quickly. In addition to demand, criminal also thinks in terms of prices and sizes. While a larger commodity may have high resale value or high demand, it may be more difficult for a shoplifter. Commodities that are more portable are a larger target. Such items can be sold easily on different markets on the street (Spapens, 2010).

Conclusion

Mac’s Organized Retail Crimes is one example of recent highly publicized crimes that impacted the retail industry. Criminal gangs employed a variety of techniques with an element of distraction. The scale, losses, and frequency of the crime was significantly greater. Unlike the shoplifter, organized retail crimes used a network of well-trained participants whose sole purpose is to shoplift large quantities for profit. They relied on expertise, experience and well-planned execution to hit the retail stores quickly, while stealing as much merchandise as possible. Such merchandise is later shipped overseas or placed on black markets and resold to traders who believe they are discount priced goods. A large number of organized retail crime incidents suggest the prevalence in department stores and large specialty stores.  The most important factors that gangs take into consideration include merchandise type, store location, loss prevention measures and resell value. The losses increase costs for retailers and, as a result, prices for consumers. In most cases, retail criminals have adequate knowledge of a retailer’s security precautions and loss prevention strategies. The information helps in planning out multiple techniques for circumventing them. The merchandise can be shipped overseas or placed on black markets and resold to traders who believe they are discount priced goods.

References

Bamfield, J. A. (2012). Shopping and Crime (pp. 1-10). Palgrave Macmillan UK.

Kopun Francine (2014) Organized retail crime taking off in Canada.

Mac’s (2015) Crimebusters. 

Roberts J. (2015) Walmart’s Use of Sci-fi Tech To Spot ShopliftersRetrieved from http://fortune.com/2015/11/09/wal-mart-facial-recognition/

Spapens, T. (2010). Macro networks, collectives, and business processes: An integrated approach to organized crime. Eur. J. Crime Crim. L. & Crim. Just., 18, 185.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for order research paper.

Computer fraud

Introduction

            Computer fraud is using a computer to take, alter or gain unlawful use of electronic data of computers or systems. In United States jurisdiction, computer fraud is particularly prescribed by Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. This Act criminalizes all criminal computer-related acts under the federal jurisdiction. Computer fraud the suspected activities such as distributing hoax emails, unauthorized access to a computer, data mining those millions as well as malware, illegal gathering of identification information to use in accessing, use illegally obtained credit cards, stealing of Social Security numbers among others. Many hack computer systems to get large volumes of data for unlawful use. They also send viruses or worms with intent to ruin another party's computer or computer systems. In accomplishing this, criminals use social engineering, viruses, phishing well as DDos attacks as tactics to disrupt service or gain access to victim’s funds for fraud reasons.

AUG. 11, 2015: Nine Charged in the Insider Trading Case Tied to Hackers

            It was a mutual relationship that brought the cyber criminals to the dark reaches of the online world.  Living in their suburban homes in the US,  a nine-man rogue stock trader managed to send overseas hackers their shopping lists of corporate information releases they needed to guard before being made public (Hong, 2015,). The hackers who were working from Ukraine would then forward the how-to videos through email with full instructions to gain access to all pilfered income releases. In summary, the 32 traders together with their expert hackers reaped over $100 million in unlawful proceeds in a complex and brazen scam which is the greatest to match the wizardry of cyber -hacking to traditional insider trading. This was according to the court filings which was made public.  The indictment said that among those men were, Vitally Korchevsky, a hedge proceed manager and a retired Morgan Stanley staff based in one of the Philadelphia’s suburb, benefited    $17 million from illegal profits. This five-year fraud came undone when some federal prosecutors from New Jersey and  Brooklyn in collaboration with  Securities and Exchange Commission’s regulators and supportive law enforcement partners,  contacted multiple arrests,  filed indictments, and a lawsuit against the ever reigning loose business confederates’ network.

            In August 2015, the authorities managed to arrest Korchevsky at his home which is based in Glen Mills, Pa. the other four fraud master-minders were arrested in Georgia and in estates of Brooklyn. Warrants of arrest had been issued and from the arrest, three of them were kinsmen with ties in Ukraine. According to the United States attorney for New Jersey district, Mr. Paul Fishman, the hackers were relentless with a lot of patience. In a particular indictment, federal prosecutors based in New Jersey confirmed that five the hackers unlawfully gained access to companies such as Business Wire as well as PR Newswire for more than five years and defrauded them over 150,000 information releases. The publicly traded corporations were preparing these releases before releasing it to the public. Another victim company whose releases taken before being made public were the Market wired company. The United States attorney for New Jersey district never faulted the wire services as he confirmed that they had worked well in investigations. The illegally acquired news releases gave the fraudulent traders, of which four got charged in the separate indictment which was unsealed by prosecutors in Brooklyn. This was unlawfully having a huge advantage over other traders in the stock market allowing them to trade on information before getting wired. The individuals who used the unlawfully acquired information to trade in the stocks paid hackers a specific fee or a specific percentage of profits gained from fraudulent trading. The authorities confirmed that the illegal traders seeking illegal edges created shopping lists kind of to the hackers for the types of releases they desired and the firms they indented to trade on. The on-mission men got information from over 30 companies, which included, Clorox, Bank of America, Caterpillar as well as Honeywell. Being deliberate actions by traders, the law enforcement authorities asserted that they managed to trade prior the information contained in approximately 800 of the hundreds of thousands of releases they got a sneak peek at (Van Swol,  Braun & Kolb, 2015). This trend indicated a systematic and well-timed strategy to conceal their fraudulent activities. The authorities also confirmed that, in many situations, the men held many conversations through email as well as online messages, boldly discussing their activities. According to the indictment, at  a particular  scenario  in 2012, for instance, one of the accused  wrote in  The Russian language  in an online  live chat message, “I’m now  hacking into  prnewswire.com system .” In a second scenario, one accused   emailed 96 fraudulently acquired news releases to an individual with a heading, in Russian, that read “fresh, new stuff.” The email continued and said, “If he says that he does not understand what this is all about, inform him ‘quarterly report,’

            The indictment said that the authorities took an initiative to monitor some defendants for some years.  After thorough follow-ups in November 2012, the authorities seized a laptop from one of the hackers and on scrutiny; they found approximately 200 nonpublic information releases which were the private release for PR Newswire. Those charged in New Jersey indictment for breaking into t newswire networks included; Arkadiy, 51; Oleksandr, 24; Dubovoy, 28; Ivan Turchynov, 27; and Pavel Dubovoy, 28. Also, Brooklyn prosecutors also charged   Mr. Korchevsky, Khalupsky, 45; Leonid, 47; as well as Alexander 47, who are United States residents (Leukfeldt, 2014). They had personal brokerage accounts in some biggest investment banks in the United States. The banks included Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan Chase as well as Jefferies.  Among them, two were at one time registered with S.E.C., such as Mr. Korchevsky.

The authorities confirmed through court papers that that the illegal independent traders, as well as hackers based abroad, shared login as well as password details for all brokerage accounts they managed. It, therefore, made it easier to trade and at the same time transfer payments to their destined locations. In a statement made by Kelly Currie who is the federal attorney in charge of Brooklyn, that team of networks hackers and traders was an unholy alliance. In a confirmed court report, the authorities said that millions of dollars in those fraudulent trading had was recovered from all bank accounts managed by traders as well as hackers.  Like a full force fight against fraud, authorities went ahead to seize some homes, a boat as well as an apartment complex which they purchased from the proceeds of their fraudulent activities.

Charges and how they demonstrated financial fraud intend

            The charges passed against the men demonstrated many ways through which computer hackers can richly profit from illegally acquired information. Matthew Schwartz, a lawyer at Boies, Schiller & Flexner and a former prosecutor in Manhattan who worked on cases involving digital crime said the crime was motivated to become rich. He asserted that whenever people think of hackers who try to gain from their offense, they usually think of individuals who access and steal bank account details or sell sensitive identifying information.  He said that the reality had exemplified by charges against the team where the hackers managed to gain access sensitive and valuable information and profited off of it in all ways imaginable.

            In a similar case, Manhattan prosecutors filed charges against five men team where some of them played a role in the breach at the JPMorgan Chase, which leads to the loss of customer information for over 83 million accounts (Wolfe, 2015). The authorities asserted that the suspected group intended to those millions of email addresses illegally acquired for hacking to extend stock manipulation plans involving many spam emails to shoot up the prices of suspected worthless stocks. In another charge example, the scheme was as well similar what the court said it happened in 2005 where the S.E.C. charged a team of traders based in Estonia with hacking Business Wire to steal news releases for purposes of informing their intended trades. Therefore hacking or corporate news releases theft remain a computer based strategy for traders looking for illegal edges to use over years. Despite the similarity, uncovered group seemed further tactical when compared the Estonian online hackers since its scheme was broader when compared to anything that had previously been uncovered by enforcement authorities. From the critical analysis, this case is the first of different cases where hackers utilize purloined corporate information to carry out securities fraud.  In another incidence which occurred in 2015, a computer consulting firm Fire Eye confirmed uncovering of a complex team of hackers, called Fin4. The team had specialized in aiming at email networks of huge pharmaceutical as well as financial institutions to access market-sensitive details as well as deals. This revelation was also critical since it outlined in the report that Fire Eye, in California, shared with S.E.C., as well as the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The revelations helped his authorities in pursuing the case.           As a measure, the S.E.C requested companies to give information on information acquired in breaches of their computer- based networks. Further as a lesson, authorities undertook same steps with many huge public relations.  In confirming the this criminal trend, a threat intelligence manager at  Fire Eye, who worked on Fin4 report confirmed similarities as well as differences between approaches the group he had observed used and those handled up federal authorities. He asserted that the targeting overlap in both had deliberate pursue of market-moving information to benefit fiscally in the stock trade.  He also added that the only differences among such groups are the places where the information gets sourced. Therefore despite the differences, the goal in such crimes remains where hackers infiltrate networks and gain private, sensitive information to gain an edge in targeted trades.

Challenges in fighting computer fraud

            Currently, the world continues to experience complex and self-sufficient technology underground economy where data remains an illicit commodity. Stolen financial and personal data used, for instance, to gain access to bank accounts, credit cards, or fraudulently establish new credit lines has huge monetary value. This situation remains a driving force for criminal activities such as phishing, pharming, malware distribution as well as hacking corporate databases. Such crimes get supported by an infrastructure of malicious code writers; web hosts specialists as well as people with the ability to lease networks of compromised computers to commit automated crimes. Despite the value of cybercriminal economy not yet known, recent estimate in global corporate losses stands at around €750 billion each year (Katz, 2013).

            Currently, advances in the communications technologies, as well as the “informatisation" of the world, continues converged as never before. It has created to the industrialization of crime type where commodities, personal data, move so quickly to the extent that the conventional law enforcement cannot manage to keep pace. Computer fraud rates continue increasing with the adoption of Internet. Mobile access to The Internet and continuous broadband internet infrastructure deployment in the, therefore, creates vulnerability levels. Adopting these internet technologies poses potential external as well as internal threats. Additionally, increased data outsourcing data to third parties creates imminent risks to security as well as data protection (Lynn Winmill, Metcalf & Band, 2010).

Conclusion

            With the advent of computer technology, complexity in crime has also increased.  The inability of criminals to victimize from any location has given them a loophole to escape apprehension.  With technology, they manage to carry out crimes overseas and, therefore, making arrests difficult. Since the losses from computer fraud continue to increase, there is a need for authorities to come up with international policies to help address these crimes. Companies should also take precautionary measures to protect their information to avoid data theft which is critical for defrauding purposes. Technology should also innovate ways through which firms can block hackers and attackers as a preventive measure.

References

Hong, C. N. (2015, August 12). Hackers Tapped a Bonanza of Data for Traders, U.S. Says, Wall             Street             Journal (Online). p. 1

Katz, L. (2013): SYMPOSIUM ON CYBERCRIME. Journal of Criminal Law &             Criminology, 103(3), 663-665.

Leukfeldt, E. (2014): Cybercrime and social ties. Trends in Organized Crime, 17(4), 231-249.       Doi:             10.1007/s12117-014-9229-5

Lynn Winmill, J. B., Metcalf, D. L., & Band, M. E. (2010). CYBERCRIME: ISSUES AND        CHALLENGES IN THE           UNITED STATES, Digital Evidence & Electronic    Signature Law Review, 719-34.

Van Swol, L. M., Braun, M. T., & Kolb, M. R. (2015): Deception, Detection, Demeanor, and       Truth Bias in             Face-to-Face and Computer-Mediated Communication. Communication     Research, 42(8), 1116-1142. Doi: 10.1177/0093650213485785

Wolfe, N. A. (2015): Hacking the Anti-Hacking Statute: Using the Computer Fraud and Abuse   Act to Secure Public Data Exclusivity. Journal of International Human Rights, 13(3),       301-315.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for order research paper.

Business Intelligence

Iteration 1: Brainstorming

The session involved conducting meetings with intellectuals and experts to determine the network architectures that are desirable for supporting business intelligence systems. The main objective of the meeting was the determination of the network requirements that support business intelligence. The sessions shall discuss the various network topologies, the network standards and the network hardware and the software standards. The entire session opened the various security issues to solve and implement in the network. The session also considers the implementation of the hardware components of the proposed network to support business intelligence. The proposed network project looks at implementing both the wireless and the wired connection. The final process of the network discussion involved the solution to the future increase of the users of the network. The session also discussed the process of implementing of the future technological that support business intelligence.  

Planning

The director of Information Technology Mr. Sung provided the network schedule that implemented the laying down of the wireless and wired network. The project development took two weeks. Mr. sung’s meeting schedule involved three facilitators namely Mrs. Angel, the director of Wide Area Network WAN and Local Area Network (LAN) networks.  Mr. Dan the system designer. Mr. Alex the network administrator.  The first session involved the preparation of the meetings, and then Mr. Dan was the supervisor. According to Mr. Dan preparation of the meeting involved the setting and configuring of the network in the meeting venues. The subtask includes setting the network access points in the meeting hall. The session required the projectors and laptop. The preparation of the session also required facilities like the installation of video configurations devices. The session also required the installation of the webinar enabling l drivers and setting and fixing hardware and software devices (P.M. Dan, personal communication, 03 January 2016). The session took two days.

Mrs. Angel facilitated the first training on the introduction of Wide Area Network (WAN) and the LAN networks. The subtask in the meeting included the installation of the simulation software from Cisco. The session required opening the control manager, accounts password and installation graphic enabling drivers (G.N. Dan, personal communication, 09 January 2016). The session training took four days.  The expected results after the training include understanding the Wide Area Network (WAN) and LAN networks, designing network architectures and running models of proposed network.

Mr. Alex led facilitated training on the topologies and the networking protocols. The session included tasks involving field practical in laying down the real-time network. The requirements of training session included the fiber optic cables, the Ethernet cables and the wireless enabling devices (J.M. Alex, personal communication, 05 January 2016).  The session took four days. The expected results of the meeting included acquiring skills in establishing a real-time network with all the requirements both LAN and Wide Area Network (WAN).

Action

I participated in the two weeks meeting conducted by Mrs. Angel, the director of Wide Area Network WAN and Local Area Network (LAN) networks.  Mr. Dan the system designer. Mr. Alex the network administrator. Through the guidance of Mr. Dan, I took part in the preparation of the meetings.  Mr. Dan preparation helped me in setting and configuring of the network in the meeting venues.  I participated in setting up, the new switch to support the meeting.  I also connected the switch to the main bus that connected to the router. Mr. Dan Demonstrated on how to establish network access points in the meeting hall.  I connected the projectors and laptop for the facilitators. I took part in downloading and installing facilities like the video conferencing configuration device drivers on the training computers. I installed the webinar enabling device drivers.

 I took part in the meeting facilitated by Mrs. Angel. I actively participated in the training on the introduction of Wide Area Network (WAN) and the LAN networks. Mrs.  Angel demonstrated the installation of the packet tracer the simulation software from Cisco manufacturers.  I opened the control manager and changed the setting for user accounts password. I installed graphic enabling drivers. I participated in the meeting facilitated by Mr. Alex I took part in training on the topologies and the networking protocols. I participated in field practical. Mr. Dan demonstrated laying down the real-time networks both the wireless and the wired networks. Mr. Dan guided on fixing of the fiber optic cables, the Ethernet cables, and the wireless enabling devices. 

Observation

The observation made during the iteration session included the effective and efficient training by professionals and experts in IT who included Mrs. Angel, the director of Wide Area Network WAN and Local Area Network (LAN) networks.  Mr. Dan the system designer. Mr. Alex the network administrator. The preparation of the meetings facilitated a wonderful session in the brainstorming and training session. The network setting and configuring of the hardware devices led to the expansion of the network by having another network terminal. The new switch supported the meeting thus making the process of brainstorming successful.  The process of connecting switch to the main bus contributed to the network accessing through the router (P.M. Dan, personal communication, 09 January 2016). The established network access points in the meeting hall led to the creation of an alternative source of the network in case the Ethernet network connection could fail. The connections accomplished for the projectors contributed to clear presentation of the meeting objectives. The laptop portable device as opposed to the workstation facilitated easier movement of the facilitator from one place to another. The laptops facilitated mobility. The downloaded and installed facilities like the video conferencing enhanced the online training  (G.N. Angel, personal communication, 11 January 2016). The issue of the unavailable facilitators was addressed trough the video conferencing. The webinar enabling device drivers promoted the online seminars as well as remote access to the facilities involving training.  

            The training on the introduction of Wide Area Network (WAN) and the LAN networks led to the establishment of networks. The installation of the packet tracer made the simulation of the network developed more easily. The training introduced the components of the Cisco.  The management of the control manager allowed easier working and access to learning sites. The changed the setting for user accounts password removed the administrators based configuration. The graphic enabling drivers supported the simulations and the packet tracer software. The training on the topologies and the networking protocol promoted clear distinguishing of the required standards. The laid down the real-time networks both the wireless and the wired networks gave the power to solve the issues of network failure. The process of fixing of the fiber optic cables, the Ethernet cables, and the wireless enabling devices led to the accomplishment of the objectives of the session of brainstorming.

Reflection

The training session was effectively and efficiently accomplished.  The main goal of understanding the network systems required improving the business platforms was implemented.  The understanding of architectures that supports the distributed systems was well demonstrated. The expected results after the training include understanding the WAN and LAN networks, designing network architectures and running models of proposed network. The brainstorming session equipped me with knowledge, skills, and understanding as I always aspired. The expected results of the meeting included acquiring skills in establishing a real-time network with all the requirements for both LAN and Wide Area Network (WAN.

The training session has not covered the areas dealing with the security of the network. The networking module on the basic and important issue like security was never addressed in the entire brainstorming session. The security issues shall be analyzed in the next iteration. Similarly, the hardware compatibility was never accessed within the brainstorming session since the materials applied in the brainstorming iterations was meeting. The tools required were expensive to test and prove that the demonstrated network could support future trends (P.M. Dan, personal communication, 17 January 2016). The brainstorming session was limited to the time and the main ideas in networking that can support business intelligence. The session was a preparing a network infrastructure that determining the efficiency and effectiveness of business intelligence software.  

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for order research paper.

Alterations to visa-waiver program

On January 22, 2016, the US Homeland Security Dept announced some alterations to the visa-waiver program. The alterations aim at making it harder for individuals to enter the United States from Europe if they have dual citizenship from Iraq, Iran, Syria and Sudan. It also affects visitors who have visited the listed countries in past five years.  Travelers from the five nations will be required to go through a more thorough regular visa application process to enter the United States. According to the Department of Homeland Security, the changes would take place immediately.  The plan provides limited exemptions for travelers to any of the four countries for military service or as diplomats.  Additional considerations could be made for individuals who have previously traveled to those countries for journalism or humanitarian reasons.  Approximately 38 nations, majority in Europe, participate in the visa-waiver program. The program allows their citizens to visit the United States without a visa for three months or less.  Approximately 20 million travelers use the program each year (Williamson, 2015).

The changes to the visa-waiver program are a result of Paris terrorist attacks on November 13, 2015. Given that all the attackers had European citizenship, counterterrorism officials, and lawmakers fear that terrorists could take advantage of the visa-waiver program to the commit similar crimes in the United States. From previous cases, some of the travelers who pose a security threat to the nation overstay their visits. For example, the September 11 hijackers are said to have overstayed their visas.However, a report released by the Department of Homeland Security show that the number of overstays was higher for other countries not a party to the visa-waiver-program than those that are exempt under the program. The visa waiver program was established in 1988 to enhance travel between the United States and its allies.  Countries exempt under the program are required to meet outlined standards for border and aviation security. Participating countries are also expected to have in place strong laws and safeguards to prevent counterfeiting of passports. Instead of applying for a visa, citizens under the waiver program fill out special forms. Customs and Border Protection give approval before boarding a flight to the United States.

Impacts on Homeland Security landscape

Travelers under the visa-waiver program are regularly screened against intelligence databases to check for security risks or risks of terrorism. With the changes, Homeland Security will require conducting more restrictive checks than those made previously on travelers with dual citizenship from Iraq, Iran, Syria and Sudan and those who have visited the listed countries in past five years.  Individuals eligible for the visa waiver program will still be required to fill out electronic forms administered by the US Department of Homeland Security before visiting the US. The process called the Electronic System for Travel Authorization (ESTA) clearance lasts two years.  Under the new regulations, individuals who would have previously qualified for ESTA but have a second citizenship from the listed countries will face changes as they will need to apply for visas. It is not clear how long the process will last under the new system. The changes have tightened the visa waiver program, specifically targeting Iraq, Iran, Sudan and Syria. However, the Homeland Security reserves the right to apply exceptions on a case-by-case basis (Madani, 2016).

According to the Department of Homeland Security, 20 million people visited the U.S. in 2014 under the visa waiver program.  The Secretary of Homeland Security retains the authority to choose when to waive the new requirements on a case-by-case basis. Individuals who have traveled to the listed countries for certain business activities, humanitarian activities, government business, or as journalists might be eligible for waivers. The Department of Homeland Security will be required to conduct a review of all participant to the waiver program to establish whether they are at par with given requirements.  Such findings will probably result in additional scrutiny at border crossings for visitors from countries that the Department of Homeland Security will determine to have weaknesses in their screening processes (Peterson, 2015).

The Department of Homeland Security considers the changes as security enhancements. They serve as part of continuing assessments of the country’s security in the face of evolving challenges and threats. The changes also reflect Homelands security’s determination to stay one step ahead of threats and challenges. The Department of Homeland Security determines to make the United States more secure through the Visa Waiver Program by promoting international travel while protecting the homeland. The program leverages the efforts of maintaining national security through the use individualized pre-screening of travelers, enhanced international partnerships with intelligence services and greater information sharing and more secure passports for member countries. The changes necessitate the Department of Homeland Security to collect information from the government of the participating country under review, the Departments of State and Justice, the U.S. diplomatic mission in that country, the United States Intelligence Community, and other information sources.  Other reviews will include operational site inspections of airports, land borders, seaports, and passport making and issuance facilities in participating nations (Nixon, 2016)

Opinion

The Visa Waiver Program is more than a travel program. It has been tried and tested as a security program. The changes will serve as an element of a planned approach to protecting the United States and the traveling public. Under the Program, the United States will be able to implement stringent security measures through accords with participating nations including law enforcement, auditing the counterterrorism, aviation and travel document security standards and border control of participating nations. These agreements are likely to result in high standards for managing security and terrorism threats.  The requirement that participating nations sign information-sharing agreements with the United States regarding terrorists and serious criminals and stolen and lost passports will enhance the vetting process of individual travelers. According to Department of Homeland Security, participating nations have previously provided the United States with information on known and suspected terrorists through the information sharing arrangements (Harris et al., 2015)

The information exchange compliments the already strong information sharing between the United States and participating nation’s security services.  Moreover, participating countries will provide records of Lost Travel Document Database, which Department of Homeland Security will utilize in its daily vetting of ESTA applications.  The changes significantly strengthen Department of Homeland security’s ability to identify and disrupt the travel of terrorists, criminals, and other actors who potentially pose a threat to security. While US security measures must evolve to meet threats and risks, one-sided changes may hinder legitimate travels. The unintended consequences of the legislation may hurt the program that boosts mutual security as it could spark retaliation from participating countries. The issue is whether there is real reciprocity in this arrangement as it appears to make it more difficult for Europeans by comparison with American citizens entering Europe. Europe is scheduled to review the reciprocity of the visa-waiver program in April (Madani, 2016).

References

Harris, G., Schmidt, M. S., Herszenhorn, D. M., & Lichtblau, E. (2015, December). White House Tightens Visa-Waiver Program in a Bid to Block Militants. New York Times. p. A18.

Williamson, K. D. (2015). Discriminating Discrimination. National Review, 67(24), 16-17.

Madani, N. (2016). Visa rules imperil collaboration. Science, 351(6270), 234.

Peterson, K. (2015, November 30). Visa-Waiver Program Gets Scrutiny. Wall Street Journal (Online). p. 1.

Nixon, R. (2016, January 22). Terrorism Worries; Tighter Visa Rules for Some European Visitors. New York Times. p. A18.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for order research paper.

Literature Review on .NET Technology

Literature Review

.NET technology is a technique for designing and developing applications on a standard platform. The platform is established to provide an appealing integrated development environment (IDE) that runs desktop and the web based applications over defined network.

History of.NET Technology

.NET technology has evolved over time by the upgrading of previous technologies. The technology has the origin of the primary Object Linked and Embedding (OLE) technology and the Component Object Model. The Ole was introduced with the features of sharing documents irrespective of the format. The technology allowed the document sharing of the files by embedding without redesigning, and this enhances the communication within the system. Krishma & Lalit extended their outlining of the.NET originality by describing COM technology as liberation from OLE in 1993 with the introduction of the independence. The application was split into programs to enhance the simplicity of developing the application. The .NET technology came in during the Microsoft Inc professional developers conference with the introduction of some capabilities upgrading the COM to.NET. The .NET technology was designed to comprise of intermediate language (IL) and the Common Language Runtime (CLR).

.NET Technology framework

The framework is much identical n support of the ASP.NET web applications. It enabled the development of the form based applications until the current framework that supports the nonweb form based applications. The framework operated on the Common language runtime and defined class libraries that enable the framework to support a multiprogramming languages. The common language runtime provides some services of language integration, security enforcement, thread management, memory management and process management and versioning (Dunaway, 2002). He further outlines that class libraries are capable of handling web form and XML web services classes, base and data classes as well as the XML classes.

.NET Technology components

.NET technology has desirable features of allowing the automatic resource management by enabling the developer to apply the framework without allocating memory for the program being used and deallocating manually but done automatically by calling the credentials of the application. The technology has enhanced the attractive features of object oriented programming such as inheritance, encapsulations, and polymorphism which has made it more desirable to users. According to Rossi (2002), the.NET technology had a goal of providing cross- platform operability such that it can be a multi-language support that allows the use of different programming languages such as C#, C++, Java, PHP, CSS, Visual Basics net, Visual Basics. He also outlines the basic elements of.NET technology as a smart client of the technology, developer tools, and the servers.

.NET Technology technologies

The development of.NET technology has been on advancement but some of the latest technologies based on the period of five years can be outlined as an improvement on the existing technologies of.NET.

ASP.NET MVC

The ASP.NET MVC is a simplified design pattern for building application that takes to oppose the usage of web forms as the application source that was first introduced on 26th January 2010. M depicts  Model; V stands for View and C stands for Controller. The technology architecture is applied in the development of ASP.NET web based applications by their power of being more SEO (Search Engine) friendly. The MVC architecture is based on the Microsoft.NET Framework 3.5 and the SQL server. The Model defines C# language that can be accessed by the controller and the view. The View describes an ASPX page that has no code behind the document file. MVC applies the standard directory structure and the file naming standards that are essential in the overall development of an application (Dangar, 2012).

LINQ

LINQ defined as.NET Language Integrated Query describes a set of operators applied to any.NET-based programming language. According to Hejlsberg & Box (2007), the Query is then described as the general purpose standard query operator that allows the developed query expressions to benefit directly from the compile-time syntax checking, metadata, IntelliSense and the static typing. The operators are much applied as new features in the C# 3.0 and the Visual Basic 9.0 programming languages according to their establishment in the language API. The .NET Language Integrated Query are used in filtering and key extraction that makes the application developer write conveniently the functions that can easily be passed as arguments.

SignaIR

SignaIR is a new feature added in the ASP.NET. The technology is a library that simplifies the developer’s process by making it is to integrate real-time web functionalities to an application. Fletcher (2014) has simplified as the library that eases the pushing of the server code to the client for connection in a short time than the server waiting the client to make a request for new data. He describes the function of SignaIR is an intervention that adds any real time web function to an Asp.NET application. The library is also quite useful for the web applications that require frequent updating such as the real-time gaming applications. Thus, SignaIR creates an API that allows the creation of the server to client remote procedure calls for communication between the remote client and the server.

Entity Framework

Jennings (2009), Depicts that entity framework was introduced within the Microsoft based applications for the customers to have a defined common entity data model that cuts across the data services and applications developed. The entity data platform does provide some features of advanced reporting tools within an application, replication, definition of data and security. As outlined by Agarwal & Agarwal (2012), the framework does affect the development of the database applied by the application and the ADO. NET entity framework reduces the impedance that exists between the relational model of data and object-oriented model of data. It should be understood that object-oriented data model differs from the relational data model, and the difference brings about impedance.

vNext

The vNext technology was introduced to have the impact on the.NET cloud computing. Based on the introduction of private networks that were specifically designed for sharing information, the ASP.NET provide the application framework to support the information sharing. The vNext is a tool of the.NET technology that has the capability to allow a user to host an application in IIS as it supports the side by side dependencies deployment. The technology tools is a new cloud computing optimized version that combines the MVC 6 version, SignaIR 3 version and the entity framework 7(Galloway & Matson, 2014).

Proposal

Iteration 1: Orientation and planning

The program of developing a.NET technology based application will begin by familiarizing with the working area. The orientation actions will get me through understanding the company principles, procedures, and operations. During the implementation of the actions, I will make visits to the respective departments of the organization. Upon the operations of the company, I will get to identify the models that are applied in the development of.NET technology based applications so as to determine the kind of information I require before embarking on the process of application development. After the orientation, I will prepare a plan for the project to guide me through the project.

Iteration 2: Understanding of.NET Technology concepts

The models applied in developing the.NET applications identified will get me to the second iteration of understanding the concepts behind the technology. In this case, I will take to consider the gathering of information material regarding the application development model and the kind of programming language they most apply. Therefore, the actions will particularly be the undertaking of research into the.NET programming languages and the understanding of the.NET framework that supports the different programming languages. I will enhance the knowledge gathering through the consultations I will get through to the persons already in the field to give the guidance. Otherwise, I will much rely on the journals, books, online materials and application documentations. The process will pave the way for the training phase.

Iteration 3: Training

The training phase will be the most critical part of getting to have the deep understanding of the.NET application development process. I will most of the concentrate on developing some.NET based codes by applying different.NET programming languages. The training session will be providing the physical interaction with the integrated development environment for the.NET technology that the organization uses in the development to.NET application. I will be referring to the theoretical information from the journals, books, and blogs to give the direction of developing debugging the.NET application codes. The codes will be developed in different programming languages and linked to accomplishing the function. The experience I will gain shall now apply in the following iterations to develop an application based on the.NET technology.

Iteration 4: Definition of the.NET Technology application based requirements

Once the content is at home with me, I will now begin on the development of.NET based application. During the iteration, I will conduct a feasibility study in the gathering of information so that I may determine the requirements of the application. The feasibility study will involve me through the conducting of interviews with the application end users and, in particular, the stakeholders. I will also administer a questionnaire to gather as much information as I can. After the data collection, I will analyze the data by using the Tableau software to make sure that quality is attained in the definition of the application requirements.

Iteration 5: Conduct of Divisional Meeting

Requirements determination is a critical process because the needs of the end users are ever changing. Therefore, before I start designing the application, I will conduct some interviews with the heads of respective departments. I will schedule out the meetings for the officials so that I may obtain much information necessary for the application under development. While holding the meeting, I will also administer a questionnaire to some other middle-level management group to also take part in the process. The action will give me the information regarding the application that should be included to make it meet the needs of the end users and be suitable for the organization.

Iteration 6: Design and development of the application

The design of the.NET application will begin upon the determination of the requirements and the functionalities of the application. I will develop the technical design of the application that will give the chance to determine the level of meeting the application functionalities. The technical design describes how the application will be functioning. I will also develop the Unified Modeling Language (UML) diagrams that define the inclusion of all required functionalities of the application. One the use cases are developed I will then develop the application codes by using the.NET programming languages and techniques to develop the application from scratch. The process will borrow much from the training sessions.

Iteration 7: Implementation of.NET Technology application

Upon finishing the.NET based application, I will test the application to define whether it meets the defined requirements and if its functionalities are accordingly. I will also be keen to identify some the bugs to be eliminated the application to work properly. Several testing will be taken including the system testing, integration testing, and performance testing and acceptance testing among others. After the approval of the application, I will deploy the system to the end users for their benefit. I will then take to manage the application and make sure it is up to date with the technology change.

References

Agarwal, V. V., & Agarwal, V. V. (2012). Beginning C♯ 5.0 databases. Berkeley, Calif.: Apress.

Danger, K. (2012). Understanding ASP.NET MVC (Model View Controller) Architecture for Beginners. 

Dunaway, R. B. (2002). The book of visual studio . San Francisco, Calif: No Starch Press.

Fletcher, P. (2014). Introduction to SignaIR. 

Galloway, J., & Matson, D. (2014). Professional ASP. NET MVC 5.

 Hejlsberg, A. & Box, D. (2007). LINQ: .NET Language-Integrated Query. 

Jennings, R. (2009). Professional ADO.NET 3.5 with LINQ and the Entity Framework. Indianapolis, IN: Wiley Pub.

Krishna, K. & Lalit, K., (2014).NET Framework. Retrieved on February 3, 2016 from 

Rossi, F. (2002). Microsoft. NET: Introduction of the new set of Microsoft software technologies.

Sherry Roberts is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research papers if you need a similar paper you can place your order for order research paper.