Liberal Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Liberal - Essay Example In establishing this argument, Mill explains that the contentious issue is the set of people’s actions towards interpersonal relationships and the forces that influences such actions. While liberty is a common element in liberalism and a person can undertake any act in his or her environment, such acts, whether of omission or of commission, must take into account legal, moral or social obligations that an individual owes to other members of the society. The main argument therefore identifies limitations to a person’s liberty as long as such liberty promises threats to other people’s welfare. The argument also justifies the regulations to control an individual’s exercise of personal liberty. It applies the moral utilitarian doctrine of ensuring good as a basis for necessity of such measures against an individual’s liberty (p. 17). The society’s power, whether legal or moral, over a person’s liberty also extend to actions at personal level. Consequently, an individual’s act may not be aimed at the society but liberty over such an act may still be controlled if the society or any other person apart from the individual actor may feel the act’s consequences. The external effect must however be first established before justifying infringement of the actor’s liberty. Similarly, a person may be compelled into an action, against personal will. An example is participation in a judicial process as a witness. Even though the subject is not a party to the case, his or her action has a direct effect on the privity parties to establish ground for infringement of personal liberty. Liberty is therefore a subject of macro environmental forces (p. 17- 19). Even though John’s period is closer to classical liberalism than modern liberalism, he should be classified as a modern liberal. This is primarily because of his ideas that correspond to the features of modern liberalism. His idea on liberty for example identifies a macro

Obamas Plan to Achieving Peace and Prosperity Essay Example for Free

Obamas Plan to Achieving Peace and Prosperity Essay In Cairo, Egypt, President Barrack Obama conducted a speech, addressing the problems that both Americans and the Muslims are facing. During his speech, Obama mentions the current issues that the whole world is facing as well as the solutions to these problems. Such solutions, according to Obama, can only be implemented by working together. Islamic Stereotypes President Obama mentions two stereotypes of the world against the Islamic civilization that are rooted in a history of hatred, division, and terrorism: (1) They are inevitably hostile to both the world and the human rights it upholds, and (2) their civilization is crude. These stereotypes are false since only Islamic extremists possess such hostility towards the world, and the Islamic civilizations progress and its contributions have been quite evident throughout history — their role in the European Renaissance and enlightenment, for instance, was invaluable. Islam is a Part of America Islamic culture has been evident within Americas borders, wherein Muslim communities enjoy the freedom to practice their religion while relishing the lifestyle brought about by American culture, which provides opportunities for people who seek a better life. Migration brought their culture into the country, and this cannot be denied because the constitution, which America upholds, protects their freedom to practice their cultural beliefs within the country. Through their citizenship and their involvement within American society, the United States integrated them as a part of America. Being Shaped by Different Cultures Throughout history, various cultures have influenced each other. For example. it has been mentioned in the speech as well as in history books that the Renaissance was brought to life by the Muslim culture when traders traveled across continents through trade routes. Thus, being influenced by other cultures is inevitable. It is primarily rooted from the need for different peoples to understand each other, and in the process, they prosper and achieve progress. There is a shared interest that drives peoples into adopting the best aspects of other cultures in order to promote a better future for everyone. Issues that Need to be Addressed In his speech, Obama enumerates certain issues that needs to be resolved in order to promote peace and prosperity. He adds that it should be an imperative for people from all cultures to work as a unified entity in order to solve the following issues: Violent extremism in all of its forms; Situation between Israelis, Palestinians, and the Arab world; Shared interest in the rights and responsibilities of nations on nuclear weapons; Democracy; Religious freedom; Womens rights; and Economic development and opportunity. By working together in solving these issues, he believes that the world would become better than what it is today. Obama also believes that it is a necessity to address these issues for the sake of future generations — for our children. Reference Obamas Middle East Speech: VIDEO, Full Text. (2009, June 4).

Haagen Dasz Co. Inc Integrated Marketing Report

Haagen Dasz Co. Inc Integrated Marketing Report 1. Introduction Recent years, especially the period that has started since the maturing of the electronic media and the proliferation of the internet, have seen widespread and far-reaching changes in forms of communication. A number of changes in the global business environment, including factors like market splintering, greater segmentation, information technology and globalisation, have led to the emergence of a new concept in holistic communication. Known in management parlance as Integrated Marketing Communication, (IMC) experts feel it to be integral to the improvement of competitive advantage in marketing. (Pelsmacker and Kitchen, 2004) IMC is a marketing practice intended to ensure the working together of all components of marketing, for example, advertising, sales promotion, public relations, electronic, 121 and direct marketing in a unified manner, rather than separate and disparate forces, with little in common with each other. Marketing communications comprises five broad categories, namely personal selling, advertising, public relations, direct marketing and sales promotions. Each has its own set of pros and cons and can be accomplished in a variety of ways. However, the key is to look at the available options in a comprehensive way and to ensure consistency throughout the selected media. (Vargas, 2005) The creation and nourishment of a unified message in all elements of marketing is integral to its concept. Driven by a need for integrating communication components, and the organisational exigency of large advertisers, the rapid growth of IMC has led many advertising agencies to take it up as a primary service area. This report aims to examine the different elements involved in Integrated Marketing Communication, and recommend a plan for its implementation for Haagen Dasz, Inc. (HDI) The report is structured into sections that take up the concept of IMC, the strategies adopted by HDI to communicate its messages until now, and possible ways to adapt and change them in light of alterations in the marketplace, as well as in the modes of communication. 2. Integrated Marketing Communication Communication, an integral component of all relationships relates to the exchange of information, concepts, ideas and emotions. These exchanges occur through a range of communication avenues, each of which makes its own contribution to the total exchange process. Marketers, steeped in communication theory, were quick to realise this phenomenon and adopted numerous ways to communicate with their customers, e.g., newspapers, hoardings, radio, television, and progressively direct mail, as well as the internet. â€Å"Marketing communications is the process by which the marketer develops and presents an appropriate set of communications stimuli to a defined target audience with the intention of eliciting a desired set of responses.† (Vargas, 2005) Marketing has a number of distinct avenues, namely advertising, public relations, sales promotion, direct marketing, personal selling, and in recent times, internet marketing. Each of these avenues works towards achieving specific objecti ves and great synergies come about when used in mutually reinforcing modes. In the eighties, most marketing experts saw each of these avenues as separate and deserving of different treatment. The concept of integrating all these separate components into one umbrella usage first gained currency in North-western University’s Medill School of Journalism†, through the efforts of Don Schultz. (IMC is) a concept of marketing communications planning that recognizes the added value of a comprehensive plan that evaluates the strategic roles of a variety of communications disciplines (for example, general advertising, direct response, sales promotion, and public relations) and combines these disciplines to provide clarity, consistency, and maximum communications impact. (Schultz et al., 1993) Most experts were quick to understand the innate common sense behind integrating these different sub streams of communication and using them to convey one unified message. One major reason for this was due to the realization that different marketing communication tools had very dissimilar attributes, for example while the ability of advertising to reach a large audience is large it proves to be quite ineffective in delivering personal messages. Similarly, personal selling can be very effective in delivering personal messages but is not effective in reaching large audiences. Direct marketing, on the other hand, can deliver personal messages, and reach reasonably large audiences. Differences like these characterise the various attributes of different communication tools, namely, (a) the ability to deliver personal messages, (b) the ability to reach a large audiences, (c) the level of interaction (d) the level of credibility and (c) costs, in total and per unit. (Integrated Marketing Co mmunication, 2007) In addition to this factor, the use of IMC increased because of the many shifts that took place in the advertising industry. Advertising focus shifted from being reliant on media to other forms of communication like specialised media, promotions and mailers. The market shifted from the domination of manufacturers to the influence of retailers and control of consumers. Advertising also shifted from being general towards becoming databased and advertising agencies became much more accountable for marketing success. The introduction of IMC also led to the creation of a number of benefits that included increased impact of communication, improved effectiveness of creative ideas, greater consistency in communication and better returns on communication investment. Even though marketing experts have come to recognise the benefits and efficacy of IMC, a number of unlikely obstacles continue to hinder its growth. Many companies have different teams of people working on different elements and it quite often proves to be difficult and highly challenging to produce communication with very similar messages for different types of media, considering that they have different uses and objectives. â€Å"For example, television ads are generally used for awareness generation, print to educate, and outdoor and radio to keep the message top-of-mind. In reality, the goal of all advertising, including packaging, is to sell.† (Young, 2006) Apart from this issue, a number of other obstacles also hinder the implementation of IMC strategies. Moriarty (1994) considered the cross-disciplinary managerial skills the biggest barrier to IMC, while Duncan and Everett (1993) reported that egos and turf battles were primary obstacles to integration. Eagle and Kitchen (2000) identified four groups of potential barriers to IMC success in their study of New Zealand advertising agencies and the marketing industry: power, coordination and control issues; client skills, centralization/organizational and cultural issues; agency skills/talents, overall time/resources issues; and flexibility/modification issues. Schultz (2000) saw structure the way the firm is put together as the most challenging problem of integration. Very obviously, successful implementation of Integrated Marketing Communication at Haagen Dazs will have to take account of these likely obstacles and ensure that they do not interfere in the process. 3. Assessment of the Current Position of Haagen Dazs Haagen Dazs is a pioneer in marketing and in conveying different messages in appealing ways to its consumers. The company, since its inception, has never hesitated to adopt a contrarian attitude and has gone against conservative thinking with great success. Its history of unique and different messaging started with the adoption of its name, which though it had no real connotation, gave an impression of exotica and cold Scandinavian companies. Packaging containing maps of Denmark served to reinforce this impression, a feeling carried to this day. (Chakraborty and Govind, 2006) The first break with accepted marketing thought came when Haagen Dazs introduced small portions of superior quality, extremely creamy ice cream at significantly more expensive prices. Its first forays in advertising were restricted to strictly word of mouth communication and the product depended upon its distinctively rich quality to do the talking. Over the years, through changes in ownership the company has re mained strongly committed to the concept of producing thick, rich, and creamy ice cream, and constantly reinforced its advocacy of the good life, of enjoyment, physical pleasures and sensuousness. The company has achieved tremendous success, in every market it has entered, a fact that speaks very strongly of the superior quality of the product and of the communication of the company. The company has continuously worked on the basis of a few strongly held beliefs, namely, (a) developing the brand with an attached history of perfection and luxury, (b) using the finest ingredients to deliver product excellence, (c) investing in consumer research to understand tastes and preferences of customers, (d) using selective distribution and delayed mass marketing until the establishment of minimum critical mass, (e) not shifting in its priorities and objectives and (f) using creativity and innovativeness to support brand identity. This helped the company in establishing its current competitive strengths and premium pricing. Its initiative of introducing ice cream flavoured postage stamps, in collaboration with the Austrian government, which could be used for checking out flavours as well as using on postage was an enormous success. While the number of people who use the ordinary mail in these days of broadband and email is questionable, the initiative, discussed at great length across western countries, served its purpose of strengthening the image of a quirky, fun loving and enjoyment centred product. (Marketing Concept and Market Segmentation, 2005) Haagen Dazs now operates in a number of countries in the Americas, Europe and Asia. While the company saw huge successes in the USA, it had to face enormous competition in Europe from competitors like Ben and Jerry’s, and to some extent, from Baskin Robbins. The company operates in a niche market catering to affluent and brand conscious customers willing to pay premium prices for luxury products. Its main strengths lie in its fabulous image as a premium quality, expensive brand. The company also has a very wide range of exotically named products that strengthen its image of luxury and indulgence. Few people associate the company with plain vanilla, even though it was one of the original flavours of the company, and customers think more of sticky toffee and strawberry cheesecake when they walk into a Haagen Dazs cafà ©. In recent years, the company has pioneered a range of low fat flavours in the same price range. The company, apart from making its products available in high street supermarkets, operates through well-appointed owned and franchised cafes, where visitors receive special attention, gifts, and invitations to attend special occasions tasting sessions. The company operates in limited market segments and this definitely restricts its scope to grow into the economy segments. When the company introduced its range of low fat ice creams at similar rates customer, queries about the high price led to explanations about special technology, long and intricate processes and the use of only natural ingredients. This also restricts the company’s opportunities to expand overseas and it must necessarily enter markets with high-income profiles. The company faces threats from other ice cream companies and an environment where technology makes it possible to duplicate flavours with ease. This negates the efforts of product research and development, and first mover advantage, if at all, does not last beyond short time periods. The ability to keep on producing new flavours is a source of competitive advantage in the ice cream industry, a Haagen Dazs attribute that now stands blunted to some extent. (Marketing Concept and Market Segmentation, 2 005) The company does not face any political pressures, other than from lobbies that espouse low fat foods. Company efforts to address these groups with the introduction of low fat products, apart from opening up a market segment, has helped in blunting criticism from these quarters. The company’s products target affluent customers, and global upturns in business and disposable incomes helps such companies; who deal at the higher end of the market. Inversely any prolonged depression, like in the eighties, will hit such companies hard. The fact that the company operates in the foods segment in a number of international markets makes it necessary for the company to consider local traditions, cultures and norms. Research in this area was responsible for the introduction of the successful green tea flavour in Japan. Advertising strategy, until now, has focussed on luxury and life style, on desire, taste and indulgence. Advertisements are carefully constructed with emphasis on aesthetics and use ice creams, or people as subjects. Promotional activities reflect the same association with class. Wimbledon, Ascot and the Paris Opera preferred events and reinforce the image of luxury. The advertising history of the company has been marked by its rivalry with Ben and Jerry’s, competition that intensified after Unilever took over the company. In 2004, Haagen Dazs mounted a campaign called the â€Å"Made for Each Other† campaign that sought to revitalize the image of the company. The campaign, based upon television commercials, used soft music, poetry and gentle visuals, in stark contrast to the bright and bold messages, in vogue with other advertisers. The campaign worked very successfully and led to an increase of 3.6 % in sales when the market for ice creams was otherwise witnessing a do wnturn. (Chakraborty and Govind, 2006) Recent years have seen intensification in competition in the ice cream market and a change in customer preference to move away towards healthier alternatives. While companies like Ben and Jerry’s and Baskin Robbins have also become more aggressive in their marketing moves, new companies like the US based Cold Stone Creamery are also moving aggressively into new markets. The increase in internet usage also needs suitable response from marketing departments to ensure that opportunities available are utilised appropriately. 4. Recommendations Haagen Dazs is known for its superior quality, rich taste and lifestyle connotations. The success of the company been built on these factors and it would be unwise to discard the core values represented by the brand. The Austrian campaign â€Å"Let your tongue travel† using flavoured postage stamps proved to be immensely successful because of its newness and the opportunity for many people to taste a range of exotic flavours. The emergence of a young and affluent market all over the world makes it imperative for the company to target this segment to protect and augment future sales. Advertising initiatives should focus on being youth friendly and concentrate on current obsessions like Formula One rather than on events like horse races. While tennis remains an eternal youth fixation on a global basis, the emergence of Formula One as an adventurous and affluent sport makes it an ideal platform for long-term sponsorship. Apart from changing the thrust of sponsorships messages mus t necessarily take heed of the current fascination with health, fitness and low fat foods. The company should step up efforts to push its range of low fat ice creams through appropriate advertising messages designed to attract the health conscious market. It would possibly be a great idea to introduce a range of vitamin and mineral fortified ice creams to take advantage of the current obsession with health and promote it strongly across various media. The company has recently been very successful in it Crà ¨me de la Crà ¨me campaign in the San Diego market, wherein a number of high-end restaurants participated in serving company products to high-end clientele. We saw Hà ¤agen-Dazs as a great fit for San Diegos high-end restaurants because it is made with only the finest natural ingredients, and the local scene is unique because of its many farms and availability of organic, fresh produce, said Sarah Znerold, SZPRs president. The first program, held last August, was called Creme de la Creme. Chefs from 10 top local restaurants were each invited to develop a creative and tasty Hà ¤agen-Dazs ice cream concoction and have it judged at an event featuring San Diego media and industry VIPs, Znerold said. (Slavens, 2007) Campaigns like this in different towns are bound to increase the visibility of the company’s products. The vast number of owned and franchised shops also makes it very easy for the company to obtain personal details of visitors to these establishments. The company has the opportunity to use these personal details to put together a well-designed one to one campaign, wherein customers could be continuously informed of new products, health connotations, and offered a range of benefits including invitations to special occasions and discounts on purchases. The integrated marketing communications strategy must primarily look at five functions, namely identifying target audiences, determining the communications objectives, designing the messaging content, selecting the means of communication, determine the mix of media and budget priorities and implement a system to measure the effectiveness of the efforts. In the case of Haagen Dazs, market segment targeted continues to be the affluent, quality conscious customer. It is however important to realise that the segment will have a higher proportion of younger people, especially in emerging markets and take account of their preferences. The current marketing mix is effective in meeting the needs of the target segment and a stronger targeting of the youth segment will lead to more visitors to cafes, leading to an increase in tasting and appreciation of new flavours. The communication objectives range from countering competition from competitors like Ben and Jerry’s and Baskin Robbins, as well as spreading awareness about the product. Effective messaging is obviously critical to the whole exercise and needs great thought. This is however a company strength, evidenced by the highly successful messages carried by the company in the past. The media has to necessarily place much greater emphasis on internet and direct marketing, using the plethora of customer information that could be accessed through company cafes. The use of the internet will make it possible for the company to establish personal contact with customers on a large scale, learn about customer preferences, step up research efforts and plan effectively for new products. It will also act as a very effective vehicle for spreading information about the company’s new range of low fat, health products, in both the ice cream and yoghurt range. It is important to ensure that the results of the IMC strategy be ascertained and recorded properly. While sales movement will tell its own story, strong and properly planned research will be able to ascertain the success of IMC efforts and throw up deficiencies that will need to be corrected. Bibliography Chakraborty, I, and Govind, S, 2006, Haagen Dazs: repositioning of a cult brand, ICFAI Centre for Management Research Gronstedt, A., Thorson, E. 1996, Five Approaches to Organize an Integrated Marketing Communications Agency. Journal of Advertising Research, 36(2), 48+. Haagen Dazs, 2007, Wikipedia, Retrieved April 3, 2007 from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hà ¤agen-Dazs Kim, I., Han, D., Schultz, D. E. 2004, Understanding the Diffusion of Integrated Marketing Communications. Journal of Advertising Research, 44(1), 31+. Kitchen, P. J., De Pelsmacker, P. 2004, Integrated Marketing Communications: A Primer. New York: Routledge. Marketing concept and Market segmentation, Haagen Dazs, 2005, Retrieved April 3, 2007 from www.echeat.com/essay.php?t=27166 Mcarthur, D. N., Griffin, T. 1997, A Marketing Management View of Integrated Marketing Communications. Journal of Advertising Research, 37(5), 19+. Moingeon, B. Soenen, G. (Eds.). 2002, Corporate and Organizational Identities: Integrating Strategy, Marketing, Communication, and Organizational Perspectives. London: Routledge. Oller, J. W., Giardetti, J. R. ,1999, . Images That Work: Creating Successful Messages in Marketing and High Stakes Communication. Westport, CT: Quorum Books Schultz, D. E., Kitchen, P. J. 1997, Integrated Marketing Communications in U.S. Advertising Agencies: An Exploratory Study. Journal of Advertising Research, 37(5), 7+. Slavens, R, 2007, Haagen Dazs tastes success with crà ¨me de la crà ¨me campaign, B2B, Retrieved April 3, 2007 from www.btobonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070115/FREE/701150759/1004/VERTICAL_EE Vargas, 2005, Integrated Marketing Communications, An effective comprehensive approach, Business ventures, Retrieved April 3, 2007 from www.fairfaxcountyeda.org/publications/bv4q05.pdf Varey, R. J. ,2001, Marketing Communication: An Introduction to Contemporary Issues. New York: Routledge.

Managing Life Cycles Influences in an Organization :: essays research papers

Managing Life Cycles Influences in an Organization For everything in life there is a season, and the same holds true for business. There is a life cycle that successful businesses inevitably pass through. They endure the perils up start-up, often on a shoestring; they grow to greater size and stability, permitting the owners to think about building wealth for themselves and their employees; and they progress to a point where owners have to think about valuing and succession or sale of the business (Forbes p9). Your intelligence gathering--what you need to know and when you need to know it--will vary depending on the cyclical speed of the industry life cycles. When you recognize cyclical trends you will be able to determine effective intelligence strategies. If you work in a relatively new industry you will want to identify potential (new or would-be) surprise competitors. Near the end of the growth stage, you will need intelligence that will help hold market share during the market's eventual decline ( Inside R & D, p NA). Start Up Stage The start up stage is the most trying stage. A newly formed company is still testing out the waters. Expenditure is high and usually greater then the revenue due to start up costs and other start up fees. This is the time where you need to have strong management personnel that will stick with the company during the not so lean times. They have to have clear defined goals that they can pass on to their department.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Each stage also demands different talents and perspectives, and new leaders usually have to be brought in as businesses progress. The visionary who is well suited to leading a new business through its early experimental stages is often poorly equipped to guide the venture through the expansion and integration stages, when sales and organizational skills become more important than bold thinking and creativity (Garvin, 2004).  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   The manager?s job is three-fold. They need to: 1) decide what needs to be done and how it is to be accomplished; 2) continually react to market conditions, 3) make sure his and his employees' efforts support that continually changing vision. Without a strong leader at the helm, the vision of the firm will be quickly outdated and the firm will be overrun by increased costs and declining sales (Osheroff p21). The goal of management is to see that rules are followed, budgets are met, and metrics are achieved.

Chem-Med Company Essay

Problem Statement: Chem-Med Company is positioned strongly in its industry to achieve high growth and earn large profits in the future, but it is in need of financing. To secure this financing, Chem-Med must address concerns of potential financers and investors regarding liquidity, efficiency, cash flow, and the need for funding despite apparent growth. In addition, Chem-Med’s primary competitor, Pharmacia, is out-competing the company and stealing valuable market share and sales volume with lower prices. Analysis: To understand Chem-Med’s problems, we must first look at the company’s liquidity and efficiency through the calculation of various ratios. Common measures of liquidity, activity, and profitability for ChemMed and its competitor Pharmacia can be found in the following table: Chem-Med Pharmacia 2.9 2.8 1.08 5.8 30.15% 7.00% 13.67% 55.00% 29.66% 29.56% 0.8493 1.9 Current Ratio Inventory Turnover Net Profit Margin Debt-to-Assets Return on Equity Total Asset Turnover Chem-Med is competitive with Pharmacia in terms of Current Ratio and Return on Equity. But Chem-Med turns over inventory much slower than Pharmacia, at 1.08 times per year versus Pharmacia’s 5.8 times. Chem-Med also utilizes assets more poorly, generating sales equal to only .8493 times total assets compared to Pharmacia’s 1.9 times. It is interesting to note that Chem-Med has a much higher profit margin than Pharmacia while maintaining virtually the same Return on Equity. To understand this phenomenon, we must deconstruct each firm’s Return on Equity (ROE) using the DuPont Method. ROE Chem-Med Pharmacia We can see that Pharmacia makes up for its lower profit margin with a much higher total asset turnover as well as a better use of debt to achieve a return on equity similar to that of Chem-Med. While ChemMed operates with a much higher profit margin than Pharmacia, its utilization of assets and debt falls far below the standards of its competitor, causing the firm problems. Chem-Med has a three-year plan for the future. This business plan comes complete with financial projections that the bank has used to determine whether or not Chem-Med 2008 2009 2010 is a safe loan risk. The bank has agreed to make a loan to the firm on the condition that it upholds several loan covenants,  Current Ratio (> 2.25) 2.72 2.39 1.98 Debt/Assets (< 30%) 13.51% 14.03% 13.87% expressed in the table at left. The problem statistic (a current ratio of 1.98 in 2010) is highlighted. This figure is below the mandated current ratio of 2.25. Chem-Med must address this projected liquidity problem to secure the necessary financing to implement its business plan. In addition to liquidity and efficiency problems, Chem-Med must address cash flow concerns. A pro-forma cash flow statement for the years 2008-2010 follows: Chem-Med’s cash flow statement provides encouraging data for potential investors. The firm expects to have positive operating cash flows over the $ 167 next three years and therefore requires little outside financing to finance the investing outflows which will sustain the firm’s growth. Chem-Med is very $ (66) profitable Projected Net Income (2008-2010) $ 101 and is 2008 2009 2010 Total effectively converting those profits into operating cash flows. In fact, $ 1,150 $ 1,274 $ 1,943 $ 4,367 the firm’s operating cash inflows exceed the projected profits for the Chem-Med Company Statement of Cash Flows Opening Cash Balance (1/1/08) Operating Cash Flows $ 6,050 Investing Cash Flows $ (6,205) Financing Cash Flows $ 89 Closing Cash Balance (12/31/10)  firm over the three year period. Chem-Med is effectively converting its profits into operating cash inflows and by doing so the firm has almost  enough operating cash to finance its investing outflows. There is only a very slight cash flow problem as investing outflows still outstrip operating inflows, but only by a slim margin. The firm also faces a problem in terms of efficiency in collection of debts. The collection periods for the firm for the years 2007 – 2010 are presented here. 2007 2008 2009 2010 As is evident, the firm’s ability to collect on Collection Period (Days) 53.24 61.15 72 80.87 its debts is actually decreasing in the future. Instead of increasing efficiency, the firm is decreasing in efficiency. Projected Growth In Net Income (2008-2010) 2008 2009 2010 10.8% 52.5% 49.4% Despite liquidity and efficiency problems, Chem-Med has a healthy cash flow and anticipates high growth. The projected year-to-year growth rates in net income for 2008-2010 are displayed in the adjacent table. As can be seen, the firm expects robust growth over the next three years and is therefore an attractive opportunity for investors. It appears, then, that the problems of liquidity and efficiency do exist and should be addressed. Chem-Med has a healthy cash flow and is only slightly deficient in operating cash flow, but because the firm is experiencing such robust growth, it is not entirely surprising that the firm has a high need for investing cash. Recommendations: Chem-Med’s most pressing problems involve its competitor, Pharmacia. Pharmacia is engaging in price wars with Chem-Med, taking a 59% market share to Chem-Med’s 25% share. Chem-Med should lower its prices in response to Pharmacia’s tactics to gain market share. Pharmacia is already operating at a much lower profit margin, so it is unlikely that the firm can cut prices as steeply as Chem-Med. Chem-Med can still maintain a healthy profit margin while gaining valuable market share and sales volume. Increasing sales volume through price cuts will increase the firm’s gross sales while having no affect on total assets. This, in t urn, will improve the company’s total asset turnover and bring it more in-line with Pharmacia’s. Increasing sales volume, however, will not necessarily improve the firm’s inventory turnover rate as both sales and inventory will increase to accommodate the increased volume. To improve upon this, Chem-Med should consider investing in an inventory control system or consider new methods of ordering (such as just-in-time ordering) to improve  its control of inventory. In addition, Chem-Med should take note that its Debt-to-Assets ratio is well below Pharmacia’s. Engaging in more debt financing will increase the firm’s financial leverage and magnify the healthy returns it expects to see in the next three years. This increased debt usage will also magnify the firm’s return-on-equity, making it an even more attractive firm for potential investors. Chem-Med should consider offering discount terms to its customers for prompt payment. Such terms will encourage customers of Chem-Med to pay sooner and therefore reduce Chem-Med’s collection period. This, in term, frees up cash flow for the firm and will increase its overall operating efficiency and can help to alleviate some liquidity problems. Collecting in a timely manner will also decrease the likelihood of default on accounts receivable as the accounts remain outstanding for shorter periods of time. To further alleviate liquidity problems, specifically that posed by the firm’s current ratio in 2010, Chem-Med should consider using more long-term debt. The firm could take out a long-term loan to settle its accounts payable. This would decrease Chem-Med’s current liabilities, which in turn would increase the firm’s current ratio. This would make the firm appear as a lower risk to bankers and investors as its ability to meet its current obligations will have improved. By lowering its prices to increase sales volume and market share, offering discounts to decrease collection periods, and refinancing its short-term debt with long-term debt, Chem-Med Company can improve its marketability to investors, gain a competitive advantage in its industry, and look forward to improved long-term performance as a more efficient and robust firm.

The Meaning of Faire le Pont

The Meaning of Faire le Pont This expression is very useful since it describes something very French and does not translate well in English. First, lets not mistake faire le pont with faire le point (with an i) which means to evaluate/ assess a situation. Faire le Pont to do the Bridge Yoga Position Literally, faire le pont means to do the bridge. So, what could it mean? One of its meaning is a body position in yoga; a backstretch, where you stand on hands and feet with your belly facing up. Faire le Pont An Extra-Long Weekend The instance when faire le pont is most used is to describe a very French specific 4-day long weekend.   The holiday is on a Monday or a Friday - like anybody else, the French will have a three-day long weekend. Nothing exceptional here. Here is the French Twist: If the holiday is on a Thursday or a Tuesday, then the French will skip the day separating them from the weekend doing the bridge over the weekend. They will, of course, still get paid for it.   Schools also do it, and the students have to make up for the extra day off by going to school on a Wednesday (typically off for younger students) or a Saturday - you can imagine the mess it is when your kid is involved ​in a regular off-school activity such as a sport. Les Ponts du Mois de Mai: May Days Off There are many possible holidays in May: May 1st is Labor Day (la fà ªte du travail)May 8th is the end of WWIIAround mid or end of May, we have a Christian holiday, l’Ascension.Sometimes towards the very end of May, another Christian holiday la Pentecà ´te If this holiday falls on a Thursday or a Tuesday, les franà §ais vont faire le pont (you do need to conjugate Faire to agree with your subject), and everything will be closed for four days! With ​an extra-long weekend, many French people will take off, and the roads will be quite busy as well.

Rural Bank of Suares Essay Example

Rural Bank of Suares Essay Example Rural Bank of Suares Essay Rural Bank of Suares Essay Company History ORBS was incorporated in 1974 by a small group of stockholders from the town of Shares located 25 kilometers away from the capital city in a province in Southern Mindanao. Since its founding, ORBS remained the only banking institution operating in this town of about 45,000 people. After its founding, the bank immediately found patronage among the townsfolk so that its stockholders, who were all townspeople of Shares had high hopes for their bank. Within a few years, however, the bank came into serious uncial difficulties. Whether because of lack of foresight or because of pressure from government agencies during the Marcos regime, ORBS, like nearly all rural banks in the country at that time, assumed heavy exposure in the governments disastrous countryside lending program called Manage 99 which resulted in millions of pesos of unsecured and unaccountable loans to rice and corn farmers for the bank. For nearly two decades, the bank, burdened by these unaccountable loans, eked out a survival existence as the Central Bank authorities allowed the bank to carry these uncorrectable accounts in its books and gradually write these off against whatever operating income the bank earned from its regular lending activities through the years. Until recently, therefore, the bank had not been able to expand or pay dividends to its stockholders. Progress in Recent Years Under pressure from the Central bank authorities, the stockholders of the bank were forced to infuse in 1990 another UP million in the fresh equity investments in ORBS to beef up its depleted resources or face closure by the Central Bank. By dint of patient management and ireful husbanding of its resources, the ORBS management was able to rehabilitate the bank and expand both its deposit base and its loan volume. In 1993, ORBS reported modest profits for the first time after years of breakable operations. Because of this history, Argues financial report for 1995 visibly heartened the stockholders gathered in the meeting that morning. The Planned Branch Expansion to the City Argues Justified his proposal to open a branch office in the capital city on two grounds. First, he felt that the limits to expanding both its deposit base and ending activities in the small town of Shares had already been reached. Second, the market for loans and deposits was perceived to be larger in the capital city which was the financial and commercial center of the province with a population more than ten times that of Shares. The opportunities in the city could be seen in the fact that many current borrowers of the bank were residents of the capital city, according to the general manager. These borrowers could be better served if ORBS established a branch office in the city, not to mention the more attractive deposit taking capabilities that would result from this move, he added. Argues estimated the expansion to require approximately ten million pesos, as follows Land acquisition (300 sq. M. ) UP million Building Construction and Fixtures 0. Million Total 8 million Equipment 10. 5 million He explained that UP million would be generated internally and the UP million would be sourced through a loan from a large commercial bank with a branch in the city. He stressed that the time for consolidation was over and the bank was now in a position to ruse a more aggressive expansion strategy. Reactions from the Stockholders There were mixed reactions from the stockholders to Mr.. Argues proposal. Two stockholders expressed general skepticism of the plan. Stockholder 1 why do we want to expand to the city where branches of the big banks in Manila are located Can we compete with those Argues The branches of the Manila banks do not cater to small loans of say IIOP,OHO to 400,000. This is why we have borrowers from the City. The branches of Manila banks will not entertain them. This is our niche in the loan market Stockholder 1 But there are two other rural banks in the City which can do what we do. Argues Then, its a game of who can do it better. Im not afraid of them as competitors. I think we can compete effectively through better service. How do you think weve managed to get so many borrowers from the City to come to Shares and borrow from us Stockholder 2 Why do you have to buy land and build a building Cant you Just rent space the way other banks do This way you can reduce the capital required drastically. Argues I dont like renting. You spend a lot to build a nice branch office and then theyll increase the rent and youre stuck.

How To Get Help In Windows essays

How To Get Help In Windows essays Almost all computers now have some version of Windows installed on them. When you have a question about how to do something, usually you can find the answer in Windows help. Windows help contains complete walk-through procedures, definitions of terms, and search capabilities. The first step to getting help is clicking the start button the taskbar. This is the first button on the taskbar. It is labeled start. Then you can click help. A dialog box opens with the contents tab in the front. From here you can select different topics that are in book format. Each book has several pages that are labeled with different topics. Most topics have a small button in the left corner labeled related topics. This provides links to other topics in the database. When you are finished, click close to close the book. The second tab in Windows help is labeled index. This allows you to search for a topic based on an index provided by the application being helped, in this case, Windows. You type the first letters of the word you are looking for, and you get an index list. You click on the topic that best matches what you typed. Click display to open the topic in a new Window. When you are finished, you can click the X in the upper right-hand corner to close help. The third tab is labeled find. It works almost the same as index. Find allows you to construct word and phrase queries to locate to locate help topics. The find setup wizard will build the database. Usually the minimized database size works well. The find page is displayed after you build the word list. You type in the words youre looking for, and then click on a topic that fits what youre looking for. Again click display on the bottom left of the window. This will open your help topic. When finished, close the help window. If you run into problems when using Windows help, there are a couple of things that you can do. If the computer locks up, pre...

Enforcing arbitration clauses in contracts Research Paper

Enforcing arbitration clauses in contracts - Research Paper Example Any subcontract entered into thereafter is subject to the initial contract on arbitration (Yale law journal 6). Under the American contract law, Parties are allowed to agree to arbitrate disputes arising from contracts entered as provided for in the Federal Arbitration Act 9 U. S.C. The Act pre-empts any state law which imposes special requirement on the enforceability of the arbitration. In the case of Oxford Health Plans v. Sutter, the plaintiff sued the defendant at the New Jersey state court for failure to make prompt payments. Oxford Health had entered into an agreement with Sutter that they shall have all their cases outside court. No civil action vis-Ã  -vis any dispute arising under this Agreement shall be instituted beforehand any court, and all such disagreements shall be submitted to final, ultimate and binding arbitration (Strong pg. 23). The court advocated for an arbitrator as per the contract. The arbitrator ruled that the case warrants a court hearing. Oxford sought to overturn the decision on grounds that the arbitrator had operated in excess of his authority. According to t he Arbitrator, the case was of material concern to all parties and warranted proper class hearings. When forwarded to the US Supreme Court, the court ruled that the arbitrator was within his jurisdiction to warrant a case hearing. Based on Stolt-Nielsen S, A v. Animal feeds int’l Corp case, the court ruled that the arbitrator could call for a class hearing if the matter were principle to the two parties and only proper legal channels could solve the case. The arbitrator can submit to class adjudication unless there is a contractual basis for ending the party agreed to do so (Harvard journal of law & gender). In this case, the arbitrator has not overdone his mandate to warrant a class hearing (Federal Arbitration Act). In a similar case, American Express Co. v. Italian Colors restaurants, the

112 paper Term Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

112 - Term Paper Example Through research, the paper reveals every bit of each influential factor and ranks them in accordance to their ability to influence and shape consumer behavior. In its defense, the paper takes into consideration material presentation in class, debates on consumer behavior, and independent but logical reasoning. Subjective and objective aspects revolving around influential factors like the mind map subjects, acted like a guide in formulating logical reasoning on the subject matter. The research findings revealed that all the mentioned situational factors had an influence on consumer behavior either directly or indirectly. However, the degree of influence depended upon environmental, judgmental, prior information on the product, and tastes and preferences. The research ranks the situational factors basing on personal experience and may not necessary follow the same order in other circumstances or with other individuals. According to research findings published in the International Journal of Business and Behavioral Sciences, consumer behavior is the incorporation of emotional, mental, and physical human capabilities in marketing (Jeddi et al., 2013). Through the combined synergy, behavior can be traced in product selection, purchase, use and disposal of products and services. For the synergy to bear fruits, it requires active involvement of cultural, situational, social, personal, and psychological factors. The paper discusses the mentioned factors and ranks them in accordance to their degree of influence on consumer purchasing behavior. The essay provides a vivid description on how hierarchy of influential factors plays a critical role in customers when purchasing products. To establish the connection between these factors, it is important to relate them and see how ne affects the other, and find out if they are dependent on each other. Through such an understanding, it can be easy for organizations to link human emotions and actions o their business

Portfolio Part A - Article Review Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Portfolio Part A - Review - Article Example e to strict the definition of rhetoric as persuasion they asked the rhetoric scholars to explore other forms of rhetoric thoughts which was then told â€Å"invitational rhetoric†. Invitational rhetoric was a civil approach. Issue was also sorted out by simply studying the critiques on rhetoric concepts and difficulties in addressing the medium which scopes were limited by rhetoric concepts. In this journal traditional definitions of rhetoric thoughts were challenged and then examined as the invitational rhetoric concepts. These concepts of invitation rhetoric were considered as civil approach even up till now. They carried the theory given by Griffin and Foss 1995 and described as a different and a unique type of communication that had gone beyond rhetoric as persuasion. Another main finding was that invitational rhetoric was adopted to have an exchange of information in the environment based on equality, value and civility. Studies result better when work with many other researchers in the field. The authors could have worked with more theories related to civil approach communication. The search related to feminism could also have been included to high the studies of this article. As it is talked about exchange of information in in-equal environment a lot in this article so the primary data collection and interpretation would have helped a lot in the obtaining of true

Should Abortion Be Legalized Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Should Abortion Be Legalized - Research Paper Example Though abortion had been a vehemently disputed issue, and authorities stated it as crime, the same has obtained the legal status during the second half of the twentieth century. Since abortion is completely the personal matter for women, which not only relieves unnecessary domestic, financial and social burden from the very back of women but also leaves positive impact on their health and fitness, it must have legal status in every country of the globe, and mothers should have the right to decide about the fate of their unborn children without any interference from statute of law or social norms and cultural values prevailing in their social establishment. There was a time when abortion was criticized and censured by an overwhelming majority of the people in almost all parts of the world. The people widely looked down upon the act and declared it a serious sin, injustice, and crime against religious, moral and ethical principles being followed. The dogmatists particularly condemned a nd rebuked the practice by declaring it as an obnoxious act against humanity at large, which is equally heinous to the murder of a born individual. The religious people were of the view that since Nature had allowed the unborn child to enter the world, without entering into the debate that whether he is legitimate or illegitimate, no human should have the right to stop his way to arriving in the world at any cost. Another main reason behind opposing abortion was this that the person(s) responsible for the same were regarded as the murderers of an innocent life, which neither had any contribution in arriving in the world nor did he had the power to defend himself from the cruel clutches ready to take his life before birth even. Thus, taking the life of a harmless, defenseless and innocent unborn was undoubtedly a serious crime against society in the eyes of the religious-minded people as well as for the moralists in past. It is, therefore, the act of abortion always invited displeasu re and abhorrence of a large number of the population for the last several centuries, and people always maintained very negative opinion regarding the act. Animistic religion tends to regard abortion as a direct attack on the vital principles of nature. Similarly, Abrahamic faiths including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, do not allow any step even that advances towards abortion, as the Old Testament states: â€Å"Choose life, then, so that you and your descendants may live, in the love of Yahweh your God, obeying His voice, clinging to Him; for in this your life consists, and on this depends your long stay in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers... (Dt 30:19-20). It is, therefore, the legalization of abortion had not been taken into consideration altogether till the end of the nineteenth century. Somehow, time took the drastic turn, and society started entering into debates and discussions in respect of the validity of abortion in the best interest of women and society. T he supporters of abortion argue that since the mother is the major sufferer before and after the birth of children, she should have been granted the permission to decided whether the child should be born or not.

Case study Coursework Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 250 words

Case study - Coursework Example The company is currently undergoing a managerial meeting to find solutions for goal of achieving greater growth. The top seven managers are present there. It seems the company needs help due to the fact they are steering off course and wasted two days discussing short term operating problems. The company needs to hire a consultant to help them. If a board of directors exists it should be involved in the process. A representative from each of the worker unions should be present as well to provide added insight that could be helpful in finding a solution. The project champion should be the external consultant. Sign off - The current project requires a detailed plan of how the company is going to achieve growth in the long term. The person who is ultimately responsible for the project is the founder of the company, John Bigboss. He is the person that is supposed to sign off on the project. Tips - Some helpful tips to consider is documenting the progress of the project at all times and setting a specific timeline for completion of the project. It is important align the goals of the company with the employee expectations. All stakeholders should receive a written communication of the company strategic shift. A mitigation plan should in place to minimize business

Pettiness,jealousy,and selfishness abound in our daily interactions Essay

Pettiness,jealousy,and selfishness abound in our daily interactions with each other - Essay Example Among these vices, pettiness tends to thrive among people who have the same level of education. It is common to see people getting angry at small things like how the other looked at them or how others walk or talk. More so, it is common to see people creating enemies out of this pettiness. Instead of seeking to understand one another and the simple things that characterize us, some people will use these petty things to create enmity among one another. Thus, it is common to see neighbors who barely talk to each other despite being close neighbors. It is common to see people despising one another in a public bus despite having met and might probably never meet. With such attitudes, people forget that humans don’t live twice and fail to seize happiness whenever possible by being free with one another, understanding one another and loving their neighbors. Jealousy, unlike pettiness is seen among people that know each other and who are not ready to celebrate the achievements of others. Jealousy exists among family members, among friends and among those that you can never think could be jealous. It starts with admiration and then it goes beyond this. Sometimes, it can lead to destruction as others can do anything just to bring down their friends or those whom their jealousy is directed to. Jealousy is felt because of so many reasons such as because of someone’s beauty, wealth or even positions. People who are jealous might try to strive others from these things until they succeed In the end, it becomes like a disease that is hard to cure. Apart from these two is selfishness, which I have come to realize that is in many people. It is hard to find people who are not selfish. People with this problem are never willing to help others and the worse thing is that they want to be helped. They never want to share whether they have a lot or whether they don’t. Instead of sharing, which is one thing that keeps the society

Should Abortion Be Legalized Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Should Abortion Be Legalized - Research Paper Example Though abortion had been a vehemently disputed issue, and authorities stated it as crime, the same has obtained the legal status during the second half of the twentieth century. Since abortion is completely the personal matter for women, which not only relieves unnecessary domestic, financial and social burden from the very back of women but also leaves positive impact on their health and fitness, it must have legal status in every country of the globe, and mothers should have the right to decide about the fate of their unborn children without any interference from statute of law or social norms and cultural values prevailing in their social establishment. There was a time when abortion was criticized and censured by an overwhelming majority of the people in almost all parts of the world. The people widely looked down upon the act and declared it a serious sin, injustice, and crime against religious, moral and ethical principles being followed. The dogmatists particularly condemned a nd rebuked the practice by declaring it as an obnoxious act against humanity at large, which is equally heinous to the murder of a born individual. The religious people were of the view that since Nature had allowed the unborn child to enter the world, without entering into the debate that whether he is legitimate or illegitimate, no human should have the right to stop his way to arriving in the world at any cost. Another main reason behind opposing abortion was this that the person(s) responsible for the same were regarded as the murderers of an innocent life, which neither had any contribution in arriving in the world nor did he had the power to defend himself from the cruel clutches ready to take his life before birth even. Thus, taking the life of a harmless, defenseless and innocent unborn was undoubtedly a serious crime against society in the eyes of the religious-minded people as well as for the moralists in past. It is, therefore, the act of abortion always invited displeasu re and abhorrence of a large number of the population for the last several centuries, and people always maintained very negative opinion regarding the act. Animistic religion tends to regard abortion as a direct attack on the vital principles of nature. Similarly, Abrahamic faiths including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, do not allow any step even that advances towards abortion, as the Old Testament states: â€Å"Choose life, then, so that you and your descendants may live, in the love of Yahweh your God, obeying His voice, clinging to Him; for in this your life consists, and on this depends your long stay in the land which Yahweh swore to your fathers... (Dt 30:19-20). It is, therefore, the legalization of abortion had not been taken into consideration altogether till the end of the nineteenth century. Somehow, time took the drastic turn, and society started entering into debates and discussions in respect of the validity of abortion in the best interest of women and society. T he supporters of abortion argue that since the mother is the major sufferer before and after the birth of children, she should have been granted the permission to decided whether the child should be born or not.

Pettiness,jealousy,and selfishness abound in our daily interactions Essay

Pettiness,jealousy,and selfishness abound in our daily interactions with each other - Essay Example Among these vices, pettiness tends to thrive among people who have the same level of education. It is common to see people getting angry at small things like how the other looked at them or how others walk or talk. More so, it is common to see people creating enemies out of this pettiness. Instead of seeking to understand one another and the simple things that characterize us, some people will use these petty things to create enmity among one another. Thus, it is common to see neighbors who barely talk to each other despite being close neighbors. It is common to see people despising one another in a public bus despite having met and might probably never meet. With such attitudes, people forget that humans don’t live twice and fail to seize happiness whenever possible by being free with one another, understanding one another and loving their neighbors. Jealousy, unlike pettiness is seen among people that know each other and who are not ready to celebrate the achievements of others. Jealousy exists among family members, among friends and among those that you can never think could be jealous. It starts with admiration and then it goes beyond this. Sometimes, it can lead to destruction as others can do anything just to bring down their friends or those whom their jealousy is directed to. Jealousy is felt because of so many reasons such as because of someone’s beauty, wealth or even positions. People who are jealous might try to strive others from these things until they succeed In the end, it becomes like a disease that is hard to cure. Apart from these two is selfishness, which I have come to realize that is in many people. It is hard to find people who are not selfish. People with this problem are never willing to help others and the worse thing is that they want to be helped. They never want to share whether they have a lot or whether they don’t. Instead of sharing, which is one thing that keeps the society

Office Visit Essay Example for Free

Office Visit Essay DHL is known for its reputation and service throughout the world. Major online vendors like Amazon. com and Barnes Nobles as well as several other industries employ DHL speed post service to deliver their items and couriers to their clients. It has been an immense pleasure to visit one of their branch offices and the layout of their work as well as their office has certainly been impressive. As time becomes more and more precious in the world of today, people are willing to invest into time-saving services. DHL has undoubtedly been one of them. Several industries involved in marketing and sales on a global basis employ their services due to the reputation it holds in the industry. From receiving express packages and couriers to sending express packages and couriers, DHL has been well-known for its reputation in the express mail and courier facility and its reliability for quality service. Though its major task has most commonly been linked with the express mail task, the DHL industry spreads itself into various other industrial sectors as well such as audio visual and telecommunications, electronics telecom, enterprise computer systems, fashion and fashion solutions, global automotive solutions, pharma/healthcare and semiconductors. DHL presents an amazing work history. Founded by Adrian Dalsey, Larry Hillbolm and Robert Lynn from their last names (DHL), DHL was established in the year 1969 via first express route that started from San Francisco to Honolulu, the success of DHL didn’t just stop there. Serving as a foundation for innovative ideas, DHL was the first in its industry to provide documentation prior to the arrival of the cargoes that rushed the route of importing of goods. Due to its reliable express service, it began to gain its recognition in the industry and this also initiated to expand its routes from Hawaii and Far East to as far as the Middle East. By 1988, DHL could be found in more than 170 countries and employing more than 16,000 employees in its firm. DHL offers a lucrative career for those involved in the sales and marketing field. The career options are many, including part-time as well as freelance. While the current estimate of the number of people hired is difficult; as of 2005 statistics, DHL had employed more than 110,000 employees in more than 200 countries (DHL, 2007). In the current office visit, there were around 50 employees assisting in the tasks involved in delivery and customer service, the head of whom. It mainly dealt with dealing calls from customers and answering several queries with respect to the orders placed by their company. The office layout is impressive. Designed into several cubicles, this structure ensured proper space for each employee to work in giving them their privacy (Martin, 2001). However, there are a few disadvantages linked with such kind of architecture. I’d prefer the DHL team to work without walls. The recent article on office cubicles and the joy of employees related to the demise of the cubicles is a proof enough to show that though cubicles grants privacy, it is not the best structure for offices to work effectively (Lotozo, 2006) In cubicles, we have walls separating one employee from another thereby giving privacy but in today’s management, the best way to work is to work in teams. This requires the employees to work together and of course, without the presence of walls. As Marilyn S. Burroughs in her article entitled, â€Å"Work spaces that work: designing high performance offices† states, â€Å"The future will see more teams that function as amoebae expanding and contracting, blurring both the center and the boundaries. Teams will be disposable, sometimes lasting only several hours; theyll be wholly elastic, coming in all sizes, and people will slip in and out of them instantly. And office designs will accommodate these ever changing teams: Flexibility, spontaneity, and the need to be fluid applies to the physical environment as well as to work processes†¦ The growth of teams is helping to eliminate functional silos and to flatten organizations because teams require faster, clearer, more direct, and more spontaneous communication. Teaming requires a less-structured atmosphere, one that is much more informal, participatory, and flexible† (Burroughs, 1996). The other section of the DHL department contained the packages that were delivered by trucks to the office (the office visited was one of the DHL branch present in my city) and the packages were neatly arranged according to their localities in the storage room. Each package was handled carefully by each employee as they are responsible for the proper delivery of the package and any harm to the courier package would mean refunds from the customer from the firm responsible for the courier. The type of workload that DHL handles varies from customer service (attending calls, queries and even e-mailing that involves the use of computers) to handling courier packages. An attendant is always ready at hand to answer any queries for visitors and the work space ensures that the customer is comfortable. Though the office is divided into cubicles, a comfortable space for the customers has been designed. The space has sofas and is moderately lit. The marketing strategies of DHL have been extremely successful in yielding business on a global basis and its success has been evident since its inception. As of recent, DHL won the contract from RE/Max network. It was a multimillion dollar agreement with the company that has a network from over 60 countries with 119,000 franchises. The company will now employ DHL services for express and international shipping (Business Wire, 2007). The winning of the multimillion contracts itself is a proof of its successful marketing and contract strategies. The business has been successful since the year of its inception. DHL, of recent, employs more than 300,000 employees throughout the world. The online tool that helps in the shipping tracking on an every-day basis has been extremely useful for many customers who wish to monitor their packages. Furthermore, the DHL merged with the Deutsche Post Euro Express (that is the leading postal provider in Germany and Europe) thereby giving DHL the access to an extensive reliable road network through Europe for business and private clients (Business Wire, 2006). Therefore, the kind of offices that DHL requires is the one that assists with the needs of the employees and the customers. Since there are many vendors and merchants who have partnered with DHL, an office specifically addressing the company inquiries plays a vital role. The future plans of the DHL are many, one of which has been stated by the Deutsche Post Euro Express is the employment of robots. Hermann Franck, the DHL master mind calls this as the â€Å"Cinderella feature† where he states, â€Å"Developers also plan to integrate RFID technology into the parcel robot. The idea is simple. With transponders placed on parcels and the robot being equipped with a reading device, the machine could identify the contents of the parcel during the gripping process. The robot would be able to pick through the parcels, just like Cinderella picking through the ashes to find the lentils, explains DHLs mastermind Hermann Franck. The idea is not to put the bad into the crop, as the fairytale goes, but to sort the parcels according to specific destination criteria, for instance† (Deutsche Post World Net, 2007). As DHL continues to expand itself in various areas, it comes with new ideas as well. The DHL Company has an innovation center that addresses the needs of customers and becoming their first choice as well. DHL has been continuously involved in evolving itself technologically and keeps itself in pace with the current events and machines that would facilitate in the development of the company in every way. The modern architecture of today plays a vital role in the successes of such companies. While the DHL office visit truly gave an insight into a company’s goals, aspirations and statuses, the business architecture is worth appraising. A business architecture, as stated by the BPM institute is, â€Å"comprehensive framework used to manage and align an organizations business processes, Information Technology (IT) software and hardware, local and wide area networks, people, operations and projects with the organizations overall strategy† (BPMinstitute. org, 2007). The DHL office is equipped with the latest tracking software with internet availability. The company has also been rigorous in performing regular checks on technology where it employs the latest to aid in the innovative express service that it offers to its customers. The business has been steadily growing and every year, it has marked a progress by improving its technology on a yearly basis. Today, the trend of information architecture plays a vital role in the businesses and thus, the successes of the businesses mainly rely on what kind of information architecture has been or is being used by the business. As Judith Lamont in her article, â€Å"Setting the stage for success- information architecture earns performance kudos from customers† states, â€Å"Information architecture is the process of organizing and structuring information so that it is logical in design and presentation. It establishes categories and relationships among different pieces of information. It defines metadata schemes, navigation and search interfaces. Good architecture not only helps users find information, but also facilitates updating content by having clear rules for adding new information. And its effects show tip on the bottom line with surprising speed when users can get what they need in just a few clicks† (Lamont, 2003). The basic structure that DHL uses is the information architecture. However, it also implements the enterprise architectural strategy in order to expand its business further. Every business’s architecture plays a vital role in its success as it acts like a blue print for transformation and technology modernization. In the current office visit, I found that due to the high success rates, the employees are happy to serve their satisfied clients in every way they can. Therefore, they create a premise that works efficiently in creating a comfortable and good office environment for workers as well as customers. The DHL Company has been found to work with good working ethics and therefore, if there were any further improvements that could be suggested to this company, it could be on the basis of the enterprise architecture where it can satisfy the workers and the clients to a greater extent than it does today. The DHL incorporates seven cultures in its company where it believes that employing highly talented people in its office actually boosts the status of being a responsible global corporate. Furthermore, it strives to deliver excellent quality and fosters openness. The company also acknowledges its social responsibility as well as strives to act in an entrepreneurial manner. This makes the company look professional and therefore, is the key success to all its ventures. Since it abides by the seven corporate cultures identified, the employees abide by it acknowledging its essence in the industry. Regular training and rewards are given to employees who perform well in their work. The DHL Company also believes that it is through its seven corporate cultures that it poses a stiff competition for its competitors. The benefits of enterprise architecture have been proved efficient in the world of today. If DHL wants to pursue its interests and expansions further, it should acknowledge the essence of enterprise architecture and therefore, as R. Suter in his article entitled, â€Å"Securing strategic benefit from enterprise architecture† states, â€Å"Enterprise architecture enables the transformation of organizations into efficient users of capital, be it human/intellectual, organizational, or technical. It does so by identifying capability and resource requirements of the agency mission before resources are committed to development, thereby minimizing the risk of costly rework and schedule overruns; identifying reuse; and streamlining opportunities for technologies, processes, procedures, and information assets. During subsequent development, architecture also enables the management of out-of-scope changes which, however meritorious, would derail subsequent modernization efforts† (Suter, 2007). The proper framework of any organization helps in the building of a successful business and therefore, only a proper architecture that updates and aligns itself with the business policies of today can assure that the business can be successful. Management itself is considered a part of architecture that ensures that there is a continuous development. DHL’s business plans have been consistent and successes have been evident. The fact that it provides excellent client and customer service is the reason why many companies prefer to deal with DHL though some of its prices may seem high compared to its competitors. DHL maintains itself by sustaining its ties through its sustaining program where it helps sustain environment (which is a social responsibility), economic performance (by promoting sustainable economic development), people and communities (by providing employment opportunities) and many more. It helps in the continuous development of talents for its employees by offering employment training and development programs. Thus, an employee working with DHL is continuously updated and its corporate values help in maintaining a fair attitude towards its employees. The ethical understanding of the DHL Company is evident through its sustaining programs that highlight on equal opportunities and also promotes general health promotion campaigns followed by providing an ideal management program that rewards the efficient and hardworking employees (DHL International, 2007). Maintaining such a network has helped DHL to advance further and I believe the management style of DHL is absolutely efficient in delivering success to its members and thus, is well managed. As DHL further undergoes expansion, it is evident that there is a scope for further additions to its offices throughout the world and if any recommendation is to be offered, I believe it would be asking the DHL to comprehend the significance of software architecture in the world of today. Basically, it is just a blue print for constructing new products and therefore, as DHL aims to be innovative in its methods (thereby providing satisfactory service to its clients and customers); an expansion into the software architectural strategy would be a wonderful addition. The easy part about the software architecture would be that it wouldn’t require any installations but would products based on software architecture are installed. The role of software architectural strategy is to account for the entire development of the product that is normally done by various sectors such as building and configuring. Since several sectors of DHL deal with several aspects of technology, the software architectural strategy would provide a fundamental base for the development of new products with innovative ideas (Sanders, 1992). This is the IBM’s Distributed Data Management Architecture and is meant for distributed application a service which is similar to the one we encounter in DHL Company. This would only serve as an innovative step for the DHL to proceed further in order to satisfy the clients and customers it sustains in its database.

Challenges to Defining Cybercrime

Challenges to Defining Cybercrime What is Cybercrime? At this point of time there is no commonly agreed definition of ‘Cybercrime’. The area of Cybercrime is very broad and the technical nature of the subject has made extremely difficult for authorities to come up with a precise definition of Cybercrime. The British police have defined Cybercrime as ‘use of any computer network for crime’ and council of Europe has defined Cybercrime as ‘any criminal offence against or with help of computer network. The two definitions offered by the British police and council of Europe are both very broad and they offer very little insight into the nature of conduct which falls under the defined term. Most of us do a vague idea what Cybercrime means but it seems that it is very to difficult to pinpoint the exact conduct which can be regarded as Cybercrime. For the purposes of the dissertation, I shall attempt to come up with my own definition of Cybercrime; the available definitions do not adequately explain the concept of Cybercrime. In order to understand and provide better insight into nature of Cybercrime, it will be a good idea to divide Cybercrime into two categories because computers can be used in two ways to commit Cybercrime. The first category will include crimes in which the computer was used as tool to commit the offence. The computer has enabled criminals to use the technology to commit crimes such as fraud and copyright privacy. The computer can be exploited just as another technical device which can be exploited, for e.g. a phone can be used to verbally abuse someone or stalk someone, someway the internet can be used to stalk someone or verbally abuse someone. The second category will include offences which are committed with intention of damaging or modifying computers. In this category the target of the crime is the computer itself, offences such as hacking. Whichever categories the offence committed falls in, ultimately it are us the humans who have to suffer the consequences of Cybercrime. Now we know that there are two ways in which the computer can be used to commit offences, my definition of Cybercrime would be: â€Å"Illegal acts using the computer as instrument to commit an offence, or targeting a computer network to damage or modifying computers for malicious purposes† Even my definition cannot be regarded as precise, as pointed earlier that due to the broad and technical nature of Cybercrime, it almost impossible to come up with a precise definition. The term Cybercrime is a social term to describe criminal activities which take place in world of computers; it is not an established term within the criminal law. The fact that there is no legal definition of Cybercrime within criminal law makes the whole area of Cybercrime very complicated for concerned authorities and the general public, it creates confusion such as what constitutes as Cybercrime and if Cybercrime cannot be defined properly how will the victims report the crime? The lack of proper definition means that majority of the Cybercrime which takes place is unreported as the victims and the authorities are not sure whether the conduct is a Cybercrime. It is estimated that 90% of the Cybercrime which occurs is unreported. Types of Cybercrime Computer can be used to commit various crimes, in order to have a better understanding of Cybercrime; we shall look at individually the types of crimes which are committed in the world of computers. It will not possible to describe every type of Cybercrime which exists due to the word limit, we will only concentrate on crimes which are considered to be major threats to our security. First Category Fraud Fraud can be defined as use of deception for direct or indirect financial or monetary gain. The internet can be used as means targeting the victim by replicating â€Å"real world† frauds such as get rich quick schemes which don’t exist, emails which demand an additional fee to be paid via credit card to stop loss of service such as internet or banking. The increasing availability of the internet means that fraudsters can carry out fraudulent activities on a grand scale. Fraud is a traditional crime which has existed for centuries and internet is merely a tool by which the fraudsters actions are carried out. Fraud has become a serious threat to e-commerce and other online transactions. Statistics suggest that internet only accounts for 3% of credit card fraud, credit card fraud is one of the more difficult frauds to commit on the internet, however other forms of fraud such as phising are more easier to carry out using the internet and equally lucrative. Phising is a form of fraud which is rapidly increasing. Phising is when you get emails from commercial organizations such your bank and other financial institutions, they would ask you to update your details, emails look genuine and it is a scam to trick people on giving their details. There are no official figures available on ‘phishing scams’ but on average I receive about three emails everyday asking me to update my bank account details. Recently there was email going around asking the staff members and students of LSBU to update their personal details, the email looked genuine but the ICT staff informed students/staff to ignore as it was a trick to gain personal information. Since the advancement of technology, it is has become easier and cheaper to communicate and fraudsters are also taking advantage of technology because it is easier to exploit the internet and it is cheaper than other alternatives such as phone and postal mail. There are other forms of fraud such as auction fraud, it is when buy goods in auction and you pay for the item but your item will never turn up. Fraud is one of the lucrative crimes on the internet; experts suggest that it is more than trafficking drugs. The reasons why fraudsters prefer internet is because: Internet has made mass communication easy and it is cheap, same email can be sent to millions of people very easily and cheaply with just one click of button. Majority of users do not have adequate knowledge on how technology works, this makes it easy for fraudsters to fool innocent people into taking an action such as giving their personal details. Internet users are considered naà ¯ve in the sense that they have too much faith in the information they receive via the internet, therefore, they do not take necessary steps to verify the information and often get tricked in handing out their credit card or personal details. Offences against person(s) Offence against a person can either be physical or mental, it is not possible to cause direct physical harm to a person using a computer but it is possible to cause mental harm such as anxiety, distress or psychological harm. It can be done by sending abusive or threatening emails or posting derogatory information online. Stalking is a crime which is done to harass another person repeatedly. As the number of user on the internet increased, the opportunities for abuse have also increased. It is possible to use internet as a tool for sending abusive emails, leaving offensive messages on guestbooks, or posting misinformation on blogs. In some cases, cyberstalkers have morphed images of their victims onto pornographic images and then emailing the pictures to relative and work colleagues to cause embarrassment. There are mainly three reasons for committing a crime such as stalking, Main reason is usually when relationships fail, former intimates usually target their ex-boyfriend/girlfriend to get revenge. Second reason for cyberstalking is boredom; some people usually pick random people and target them by sending them abusive and threatening emails just for fun. Cyberstalkers take advantage of anonymity of the internet to cause distress to their victim’s life. Hate and racist speech is also a form of crime which escalated since the introduction of the internet; it can cause traumatic experience and mental distress to those who are targeted. Post 9/11, there have been many websites set up to mock the religion Islam, such as www.laughingatislam.com, this website has been cause of distress to many Muslims around the world. Sexual offences This category includes offences which have sexual element, such as making undesired sexual approaches in chat-rooms and paedophiles harrasing children. Child pornography and child protection are one of the main concerns on the internet. Paedophiles are taking full advantage to exploit the technology for viewing and exchanging child pornography. Paedophiles use the internet to their advantage, they use chat rooms and other popular social networks such as facebook to entice and lure children into meeting them. Many popular chat rooms such as MSN Chat and Yahoo chat have closed down their chat rooms to protect young children but closure of popular chat rooms have not stopped paedophiles from using less popular chat rooms and other social networks. Second category Hacking related offences Hacking can be defined as gaining unauthorised access to a computer system. As soon as we hear the word ‘hacking’, we tend to think that it is a crime, it should be noted that hacking started of as show of skill to gain temporary access to computer systems. It was rather an intellectual challenge than a criminal motive. But now, many hackers misuse their skills to inflict damage and destruction. Examples of hacking include stealing confident information such credit card details. In a recent incident of hacking, Harriet Harman whose is a politician, taking part in upcoming elections. Her website was hacked and the blog section of her website encouraged the audience to vote for Boris Johnson whose is a competitor of Harman Harriet. Boris Johnson has also complained that his email account was hacked recently. Most politicians believe that internet as a medium will be a major part of election campaigns and activities such as hacking can sabotage election campaigns by posting disinformation on candidate’s websites. Virus and Other Malicious Programs Virus is a malicious code or program that replicates itself and inserts copies or new versions onto other programs, affecting computer systems. Viruses are designed to modify computer systems without the consent of the owner or operator. Viruses are created to inflict senseless damage to computer system. It is a widely accepted perception that crime is committed in times economic distress. Criminals do not gain any monetary benefit; it is simply done to show off their computer skills. Some viruses are failed programs or accidental releases. The most famous virus which was released is the I LOVE YOU virus or commonly known as the ‘love bug’. The virus damaged millions of computers worldwide; it caused damage worth of $8.5bn, the author of the virus claims that it was released to impress his girlfriend. Legislation on Cybercrime It is often believed that the internet is just like the ‘wild west’ where there no rules and regulations and people are free to carry out illegal activities. Fortunately, this is not true at all; there is legislation which exists to protect us from cybercrimes. Type of crime Legislation Fraud Fraud Act 2006(Covers all types of possible frauds) Offences against person(s) The Public Order Act 1986(Hate speech) Sexual Offences The Protection of children Act 1978 The Criminal Justice Act 1988 The Criminal Justice an Public Order Act 1988 Sexual Offences Act 2003 After carefully reviewing all pieces of legislations mentioned above, I can conclude by saying that legislation we have at the moment is adequate enough to protect us from any sort of traditional crime carried out using computers. There were few anomalies which have been removed now. Anomalies The Theft Act 1968 which previously covered fraud has been replaced by Fraud Act 2006 to cover anomaly under the previous legislation. In the case of Clayman, it was held that it is not unlawful to defraud a computer; the courts do not regard computers as deceivable as the process is fully automated. In theory if we apply the principle deriving from the Clayman case then it will not be unlawful to false credit card number when signing up for an online service such as subscription to a newsgroup or online gaming. There is only exception to this rule that it will not apply if deception involves licensed telecommunications services, such as dial-up chat lines pay-per-view TV. Second anomaly before us was that information was not regarded property. In the case of Oxford v Moss, in this case a student took a copy of forthcoming exam from a lecturer’s desk and made a photocopy of that exam paper, it was held that the student cannot be charged under the theft act as he did not deprive the owner of the asset, a copy had simply been taken. Computers only contain information, by applying the principle deriving from this case, it means that it is acceptable to print other people’s files as long they do not deprive the owner of the file by deleting it, one would only be prosecuted if he/she steals trade secret or confidential information. Decisions in both cases mentioned above are absurd, both of them were decided in 1970s, the only possible reason for reaching absurd decision could only be lack of knowledge on technology. Previous legislation took into account the consequences of the fraudster’s activities when deciding whether the conduct in question is an offence. The Fraud Act 2006 aims to prosecute the fraudsters on the basis of their actual conduct rather than the consequences of their activities. How serious is the threat? In order to determine the seriousness of the threat, it is important to look at the statistics available on cybercrime. Type of crime Number of cases reported Fraud 299,000 Offences against the person 1,944000 Sexual offences 850,238 Computer Misuse(Hacking) 144,500 Virus related incidents 6,000000 Total number of cases reported 9,237738 Source of statistics: Garlik According to the figures, they were approximately 9.23 million incidents of cybercrime reported in the year 2006. Statistics show that 15% of the population of the UK was affected by cybercrime in someway, after looking at these figures; one can easily conclude that we are having an epidemic of cybercrime. These statistics could only the tip of the iceberg of the totality of cybercrime; experts believe that real figure could be 10 times higher as cybercrime is massively under-reported. Reasons for under-reporting Reporting any crime involves a three stage process: The conduct needs to be observed. The conduct needs to categorised as criminal. The relevant authorities need to be informed of the criminal conduct. A particular crime will not be reported if there is failure in any of the stages, therefore the relevant authorities will not take action against the criminal. There are certain factors which affect reporting of cybercrime, factors include: Sometimes the criminal conduct is not noticed, internet fraud usually comprises of low-value transactions across a bulk body of victims, and victims are not always able to spot discrepancy in their bank accounts. Lack of awareness means that the victims may not know whether the conduct in question is a crime. Victims of viruses don’t see them as victims of crime, people tend to see viruses as technical issue, and therefore, the victim would believe that no one has broken the law. Most victims don’t know which authorities they should contact to report cybercrime. Police officers have inadequate amount of resources and don’t have the expertise to deal with cybercrime at the moment, therefore, pursuing a formal complaint can be a difficult process. Once I tried reporting a cybercrime, a laptop was purchased on EBay but the seller took my money and never sent the laptop, this is a common case of auction fraud. I did try to make a complain, the whole process was extremely slow, the officer dealing with me had no clue what EBay is, I was able to register a complaint but it has been two years and my complain is still unresolved. Under-reporting is factor which contributes towards increase in cybercrime, under-reporting mean that criminals will have less fear of getting caught and therefore, they are more likely to commit illegal acts online. People’s attitude towards cybercrime Traditional crimes such as murder, rape and robbery can have serious effects on the victim’s life; in some cases the victim may not be able to lead a normal life after being a victim of crime. In contrast to cybercrime, the impact is not that serious, majority of users have insurance against financial frauds, and frauds are usually of low-value. Viruses can easily be filtered using antivirus software. Other offences such as cyberstalking usually cause some anxiety and distress. Only crimes such as child pornography have a greater impact, it is the only the crime which can have a serious consequences on the victims life. A recent survey suggest that only 37% are afraid to use the internet after being a victim of crime, majority of the users do continue to use the internet after being a victim. Cybercrime and e-commerce Cybercrime is a growing concern for all of us, however, the effects of cybercrime are not hindering the growth of the internet, and the effects of cybercrime on the e-commerce have not been drastic. Financial transactions over the internet are on the rise, number of people using internet for shopping is increase day by day and over one third of population is using internet banking. One of the reasons why cybercrime spiraling out of control is the fact that it is very easy to commit if have the technical knowledge, all you need is a computer connected to the internet, the crimes on the internet are hard to detect. It can be committed from anywhere in the world, the criminal could sitting in Africa and targeting his victim in Australia. In the next chapter, we shall examine the problems faced by authorities when investigating cybercrime. Jurisdiction Jurisdictional issues and the cyberspace Cyberspace is a world without defined boundaries; anyone can access any website using his computer. It can very difficult to locate the source of crime in cyberspace because relative anonymity and as easy way to shield identity. Even if the relevant authorities are able to identify the source of crime, it is not always easy to prosecute the criminal. Double criminality When dealing cross border crime, it is imperative that both countries should recognise the conduct as illegal in both jurisdictions. The principle of double criminality prohibits the extradition of a person, if the conduct in question is not recognized as a criminal offence by the country receiving the request for jurisdiction. Imagine a situation where a computer programmer from Zimbabwe sends Barclays bank a virus which causes the computers in Barclays bank to malfunction, the bank cannot carry out their business for 1 hour and as a result they lose about $1 million worth of revenue. English authorities would want to extradite the offender to England so they could prosecute the offender. In an action for extradition, the applicant is required to show that actions of the accused constitute a criminal offence exceeding a minimum level of seriousness in both jurisdictions. Imagine now that they are no laws on spreading viruses in Zimbabwe, therefore it will not possible to show offender’s action constitute as criminal behavior. If they are no laws regarding on cybercrime in Zimbabwe then he cannot be extradited and he will walk free after deliberately causing damage to Barclays bank. Cybercrime has an international dimension, it is imperative that legal protection is harmonised internationally. There are still about 33 countries such as Albania, Yugoslavia and Malta; they have no laws on cybercrimes. If there are no laws then those countries are considered as computer crime havens. The perpetrator of ‘I LOVE YOU’ virus which caused $8.5 billion worth damage was caught in Philippines but he could not be prosecuted as Philippines had no laws on cybercrime. Cybercrime is global issue and the world will need to work together in order to tackle cybercrime. How real world crime dealt across borders? In relation to real world crime which transcended national borders, an idiosyncratic network of Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties(MLATs) bound various countries to assist each other in investigating real world crime, such as drug trafficking. If there was no treaty agreement between two countries then they would contact the relevant authorities to ask for assistance and obtain evidence, this mechanism was sufficient in dealing with real world crime. This mechanism can only work if both countries have similar cybercrime laws; if any country lacks cybercrime laws then the process would fail. How should Jurisdiction be approached in Cybercrime? In a case of cyberstalking, An Australian man was stalking a Canadian Actress. The man harassed the actress by sending unsolicited emails. Australian Supreme Court of Victoria held that crimes ‘committed over the internet knows no borders’ and ‘State and national boundaries do not concern them’, therefore, jurisdiction should not be the issue. He was convicted. This case was straightforward as both nations recognise stalking as a criminal offence, however, there can be conflicts if both nations do not recognize the act as criminal. In Licra v Yahoo, French courts tried to exercise jurisdiction over an American company. Yahoo was accused of Nazi memorabilia contrary to Article R645-1 of the French Criminal Code. Yahoo argued that there are not in breach of Article R645-1 as they were conducting the auction under the jurisdiction of USA and it is not illegal to sell Nazi memorabilia under the American law. In order to prove that Yahoo is subject American jurisdiction, they argued the following points: Yahoo servers are located in US territory. Services of Yahoo are primarily aimed at US citizens. According to the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, freedom of speech and expression is guaranteed and any attempt to enforce judgement which restricts freedom of speech and expression would fail for unconstitutionality. The court ruled that they have full jurisdiction over Yahoo because: The auction was open to worldwide bidders, including France. It is possible to view the auction in France, viewing and displaying Nazi memorabilia causes public nuisance and it is offence to public nuisance under the French law. Yahoo had a customer base in France, the advertisements were in French. Yahoo did have knowledge that French citizens use their site; therefore they should not do anything to offend French citizens. Yahoo ignored the French court ruling and kept saying that they French court does not have the right to exercise jurisdiction over an American company. Yahoo was warned that they would have to pay heavy fines if they don’t comply. In the end Yahoo owners did comply with the judgement they had substantial assets in France which were at risk of being confiscated if they don’t claim. The sole reason why French courts were able to exercise jurisdiction over Yahoo because it is a multinational company with large presence in France. Imagine instead of France, if the action would have been taken by courts of Saudi Arabia on auctioning playboy magazines, under the Saudi Arabian Sharia law, it is illegal to view or buy pornography. Saudi Arabia court would have failed to exercise jurisdiction over Yahoo as they don’t have any presence in Saudi Arabia but it was possible to view Yahoo auctions from Saudi Arabia. The case of Yahoo is a rare example where a court was able to exercise jurisdiction over a foreign company. In majority of the cases concerning individuals, courts trying to exercise jurisdiction over foreign elements are usually ignored. In the case of Nottinghamshire County Council v. Gwatkin (UK), injunctions were issued against many journalists to prevent them from publishing disseminating a leaked report that strongly criticises [the Councils] handling of allegations of satanic abuse of children in the 1980s. Despite the injunctions, a report appeared on an American website. The website refused to respect the English jurisdiction as they argued that the report was a public document. The Nottinghamshire had no option then to drop the case. Cybercrime has an international dimension. International law is complicated area, it can be very difficult to co-operate with authorities if there is no or weak diplomatic ties, for e.g. Pakistan and Israel have no diplomatic ties, if a situation arises where Israeli citizen hacks into State bank of Pakistan steals millions of dollars from the bank, in a situation like this, one easily assume that both countries would not co-operate with each other even though both countries recognise hacking as a offence but they do not have diplomatic ties with each other, most probably the hacker would get away with the crime. A case involving Russian hackers, they hacked into Paypal and stole 53,000 credit card details. Paypal is an American company. The Russian hackers blackmailed Paypal and asked for a substantial amount of money, they threatened they would publish the details of 53,000 credit cards if they do not receive the money. Russia and American both have signed extradition treaty but still Russian authorities failed to take action, it is still not clear why they did not take appropriate action against the Russian hackers. Both nations struggled to gain jurisdiction over each other. FBI decided to take things into their own hands by setting up a secret operation, undercover agents posed as reprenstatives of a bogus security firm Invita. The bogus security firm invited the Russian hackers to US with prospects of employment. When the interview for employment by the bogus firm Invita was being carried out, the Russian hackers were asked to display there hacking skills, one of the hackers accessed his own system in Russia to show off his skills, the FBI recorded every keystroke and later arrested the Russian hackers for multiple offences such as hacking, fraud and extortion. The keystrokes recorded were later used to hack into one of the hacker’s computer in Russia to access incriminating evidence. All this took place without the knowledge of Russian authorities. When Russian authorities came to know about whole incident, they were furious and argued that US misused their authority and infringing on another sovereign nation’s jurisdiction. Lack of co-operation in relation to jurisdiction can lead to serious problems between nations, in order to avoid such conflicts, there is need to address the jurisdiction issue and come up with a mechanism which ensures that countries co-operate with each other. Where is the Jurisdiction? In the real world crime, the conduct and the effect of the conduct are easy to pin down because we can visibly see the human carrying out the conduct and the effect of the conduct is also visible. The location of the offence and the location of the perpetrator can easily be identified. Imagine a situation in which a shooter in Canada shots an American across Niagara Falls, it is clear from the example that the conduct took place in Canada and the effect of the conduct took place in Canada. Cyberspace is not real, people say that events on cyberspace occur everywhere and nowhere, a man disseminating a virus could release a virus which travel through servers of many different country before reaching the victim, for e.g. a person makes a racist website targeting Jews in Malta, uploads the website on American servers and the website is available for everyone to see, a Jewish living in Israel comes across the website and gets offended. In a situation like this where would you bring an action, should you bring an action in Malta because the perpetrator is based over there, would bring an action in America where the server is hosted or would bring the action in Israel where the victim is? There are specific laws regarding jurisdiction issues on the internet, the world is still struggling to come up with a solution which would solve the problem of jurisdiction. Positive or Negative Jurisdiction? The principle of negative jurisdiction occurs when no country is willing to exercise jurisdiction for a cybercrime. Cybercrime can have multiple victims in different countries; the ‘love bug’ caused damage in many different countries including USA, UK, France and Germany. If the damage is caused to multiple countries then who should claim jurisdiction over the cybercrime, should it by prioritised by the amount of damage suffered by each country. If the effected countries decide not to take action against the perpetrator because it is not in their best interest, the country may be occupied by other internal problems. If no country is willing to exercise jurisdiction over a cybercrime then the perpetrator would walk free. Positive jurisdiction is opposite of negative jurisdiction, how will the issue of jurisdiction be decided if more than two countries want to exercise t Challenges to Defining Cybercrime Challenges to Defining Cybercrime What is Cybercrime? At this point of time there is no commonly agreed definition of ‘Cybercrime’. The area of Cybercrime is very broad and the technical nature of the subject has made extremely difficult for authorities to come up with a precise definition of Cybercrime. The British police have defined Cybercrime as ‘use of any computer network for crime’ and council of Europe has defined Cybercrime as ‘any criminal offence against or with help of computer network. The two definitions offered by the British police and council of Europe are both very broad and they offer very little insight into the nature of conduct which falls under the defined term. Most of us do a vague idea what Cybercrime means but it seems that it is very to difficult to pinpoint the exact conduct which can be regarded as Cybercrime. For the purposes of the dissertation, I shall attempt to come up with my own definition of Cybercrime; the available definitions do not adequately explain the concept of Cybercrime. In order to understand and provide better insight into nature of Cybercrime, it will be a good idea to divide Cybercrime into two categories because computers can be used in two ways to commit Cybercrime. The first category will include crimes in which the computer was used as tool to commit the offence. The computer has enabled criminals to use the technology to commit crimes such as fraud and copyright privacy. The computer can be exploited just as another technical device which can be exploited, for e.g. a phone can be used to verbally abuse someone or stalk someone, someway the internet can be used to stalk someone or verbally abuse someone. The second category will include offences which are committed with intention of damaging or modifying computers. In this category the target of the crime is the computer itself, offences such as hacking. Whichever categories the offence committed falls in, ultimately it are us the humans who have to suffer the consequences of Cybercrime. Now we know that there are two ways in which the computer can be used to commit offences, my definition of Cybercrime would be: â€Å"Illegal acts using the computer as instrument to commit an offence, or targeting a computer network to damage or modifying computers for malicious purposes† Even my definition cannot be regarded as precise, as pointed earlier that due to the broad and technical nature of Cybercrime, it almost impossible to come up with a precise definition. The term Cybercrime is a social term to describe criminal activities which take place in world of computers; it is not an established term within the criminal law. The fact that there is no legal definition of Cybercrime within criminal law makes the whole area of Cybercrime very complicated for concerned authorities and the general public, it creates confusion such as what constitutes as Cybercrime and if Cybercrime cannot be defined properly how will the victims report the crime? The lack of proper definition means that majority of the Cybercrime which takes place is unreported as the victims and the authorities are not sure whether the conduct is a Cybercrime. It is estimated that 90% of the Cybercrime which occurs is unreported. Types of Cybercrime Computer can be used to commit various crimes, in order to have a better understanding of Cybercrime; we shall look at individually the types of crimes which are committed in the world of computers. It will not possible to describe every type of Cybercrime which exists due to the word limit, we will only concentrate on crimes which are considered to be major threats to our security. First Category Fraud Fraud can be defined as use of deception for direct or indirect financial or monetary gain. The internet can be used as means targeting the victim by replicating â€Å"real world† frauds such as get rich quick schemes which don’t exist, emails which demand an additional fee to be paid via credit card to stop loss of service such as internet or banking. The increasing availability of the internet means that fraudsters can carry out fraudulent activities on a grand scale. Fraud is a traditional crime which has existed for centuries and internet is merely a tool by which the fraudsters actions are carried out. Fraud has become a serious threat to e-commerce and other online transactions. Statistics suggest that internet only accounts for 3% of credit card fraud, credit card fraud is one of the more difficult frauds to commit on the internet, however other forms of fraud such as phising are more easier to carry out using the internet and equally lucrative. Phising is a form of fraud which is rapidly increasing. Phising is when you get emails from commercial organizations such your bank and other financial institutions, they would ask you to update your details, emails look genuine and it is a scam to trick people on giving their details. There are no official figures available on ‘phishing scams’ but on average I receive about three emails everyday asking me to update my bank account details. Recently there was email going around asking the staff members and students of LSBU to update their personal details, the email looked genuine but the ICT staff informed students/staff to ignore as it was a trick to gain personal information. Since the advancement of technology, it is has become easier and cheaper to communicate and fraudsters are also taking advantage of technology because it is easier to exploit the internet and it is cheaper than other alternatives such as phone and postal mail. There are other forms of fraud such as auction fraud, it is when buy goods in auction and you pay for the item but your item will never turn up. Fraud is one of the lucrative crimes on the internet; experts suggest that it is more than trafficking drugs. The reasons why fraudsters prefer internet is because: Internet has made mass communication easy and it is cheap, same email can be sent to millions of people very easily and cheaply with just one click of button. Majority of users do not have adequate knowledge on how technology works, this makes it easy for fraudsters to fool innocent people into taking an action such as giving their personal details. Internet users are considered naà ¯ve in the sense that they have too much faith in the information they receive via the internet, therefore, they do not take necessary steps to verify the information and often get tricked in handing out their credit card or personal details. Offences against person(s) Offence against a person can either be physical or mental, it is not possible to cause direct physical harm to a person using a computer but it is possible to cause mental harm such as anxiety, distress or psychological harm. It can be done by sending abusive or threatening emails or posting derogatory information online. Stalking is a crime which is done to harass another person repeatedly. As the number of user on the internet increased, the opportunities for abuse have also increased. It is possible to use internet as a tool for sending abusive emails, leaving offensive messages on guestbooks, or posting misinformation on blogs. In some cases, cyberstalkers have morphed images of their victims onto pornographic images and then emailing the pictures to relative and work colleagues to cause embarrassment. There are mainly three reasons for committing a crime such as stalking, Main reason is usually when relationships fail, former intimates usually target their ex-boyfriend/girlfriend to get revenge. Second reason for cyberstalking is boredom; some people usually pick random people and target them by sending them abusive and threatening emails just for fun. Cyberstalkers take advantage of anonymity of the internet to cause distress to their victim’s life. Hate and racist speech is also a form of crime which escalated since the introduction of the internet; it can cause traumatic experience and mental distress to those who are targeted. Post 9/11, there have been many websites set up to mock the religion Islam, such as www.laughingatislam.com, this website has been cause of distress to many Muslims around the world. Sexual offences This category includes offences which have sexual element, such as making undesired sexual approaches in chat-rooms and paedophiles harrasing children. Child pornography and child protection are one of the main concerns on the internet. Paedophiles are taking full advantage to exploit the technology for viewing and exchanging child pornography. Paedophiles use the internet to their advantage, they use chat rooms and other popular social networks such as facebook to entice and lure children into meeting them. Many popular chat rooms such as MSN Chat and Yahoo chat have closed down their chat rooms to protect young children but closure of popular chat rooms have not stopped paedophiles from using less popular chat rooms and other social networks. Second category Hacking related offences Hacking can be defined as gaining unauthorised access to a computer system. As soon as we hear the word ‘hacking’, we tend to think that it is a crime, it should be noted that hacking started of as show of skill to gain temporary access to computer systems. It was rather an intellectual challenge than a criminal motive. But now, many hackers misuse their skills to inflict damage and destruction. Examples of hacking include stealing confident information such credit card details. In a recent incident of hacking, Harriet Harman whose is a politician, taking part in upcoming elections. Her website was hacked and the blog section of her website encouraged the audience to vote for Boris Johnson whose is a competitor of Harman Harriet. Boris Johnson has also complained that his email account was hacked recently. Most politicians believe that internet as a medium will be a major part of election campaigns and activities such as hacking can sabotage election campaigns by posting disinformation on candidate’s websites. Virus and Other Malicious Programs Virus is a malicious code or program that replicates itself and inserts copies or new versions onto other programs, affecting computer systems. Viruses are designed to modify computer systems without the consent of the owner or operator. Viruses are created to inflict senseless damage to computer system. It is a widely accepted perception that crime is committed in times economic distress. Criminals do not gain any monetary benefit; it is simply done to show off their computer skills. Some viruses are failed programs or accidental releases. The most famous virus which was released is the I LOVE YOU virus or commonly known as the ‘love bug’. The virus damaged millions of computers worldwide; it caused damage worth of $8.5bn, the author of the virus claims that it was released to impress his girlfriend. Legislation on Cybercrime It is often believed that the internet is just like the ‘wild west’ where there no rules and regulations and people are free to carry out illegal activities. Fortunately, this is not true at all; there is legislation which exists to protect us from cybercrimes. Type of crime Legislation Fraud Fraud Act 2006(Covers all types of possible frauds) Offences against person(s) The Public Order Act 1986(Hate speech) Sexual Offences The Protection of children Act 1978 The Criminal Justice Act 1988 The Criminal Justice an Public Order Act 1988 Sexual Offences Act 2003 After carefully reviewing all pieces of legislations mentioned above, I can conclude by saying that legislation we have at the moment is adequate enough to protect us from any sort of traditional crime carried out using computers. There were few anomalies which have been removed now. Anomalies The Theft Act 1968 which previously covered fraud has been replaced by Fraud Act 2006 to cover anomaly under the previous legislation. In the case of Clayman, it was held that it is not unlawful to defraud a computer; the courts do not regard computers as deceivable as the process is fully automated. In theory if we apply the principle deriving from the Clayman case then it will not be unlawful to false credit card number when signing up for an online service such as subscription to a newsgroup or online gaming. There is only exception to this rule that it will not apply if deception involves licensed telecommunications services, such as dial-up chat lines pay-per-view TV. Second anomaly before us was that information was not regarded property. In the case of Oxford v Moss, in this case a student took a copy of forthcoming exam from a lecturer’s desk and made a photocopy of that exam paper, it was held that the student cannot be charged under the theft act as he did not deprive the owner of the asset, a copy had simply been taken. Computers only contain information, by applying the principle deriving from this case, it means that it is acceptable to print other people’s files as long they do not deprive the owner of the file by deleting it, one would only be prosecuted if he/she steals trade secret or confidential information. Decisions in both cases mentioned above are absurd, both of them were decided in 1970s, the only possible reason for reaching absurd decision could only be lack of knowledge on technology. Previous legislation took into account the consequences of the fraudster’s activities when deciding whether the conduct in question is an offence. The Fraud Act 2006 aims to prosecute the fraudsters on the basis of their actual conduct rather than the consequences of their activities. How serious is the threat? In order to determine the seriousness of the threat, it is important to look at the statistics available on cybercrime. Type of crime Number of cases reported Fraud 299,000 Offences against the person 1,944000 Sexual offences 850,238 Computer Misuse(Hacking) 144,500 Virus related incidents 6,000000 Total number of cases reported 9,237738 Source of statistics: Garlik According to the figures, they were approximately 9.23 million incidents of cybercrime reported in the year 2006. Statistics show that 15% of the population of the UK was affected by cybercrime in someway, after looking at these figures; one can easily conclude that we are having an epidemic of cybercrime. These statistics could only the tip of the iceberg of the totality of cybercrime; experts believe that real figure could be 10 times higher as cybercrime is massively under-reported. Reasons for under-reporting Reporting any crime involves a three stage process: The conduct needs to be observed. The conduct needs to categorised as criminal. The relevant authorities need to be informed of the criminal conduct. A particular crime will not be reported if there is failure in any of the stages, therefore the relevant authorities will not take action against the criminal. There are certain factors which affect reporting of cybercrime, factors include: Sometimes the criminal conduct is not noticed, internet fraud usually comprises of low-value transactions across a bulk body of victims, and victims are not always able to spot discrepancy in their bank accounts. Lack of awareness means that the victims may not know whether the conduct in question is a crime. Victims of viruses don’t see them as victims of crime, people tend to see viruses as technical issue, and therefore, the victim would believe that no one has broken the law. Most victims don’t know which authorities they should contact to report cybercrime. Police officers have inadequate amount of resources and don’t have the expertise to deal with cybercrime at the moment, therefore, pursuing a formal complaint can be a difficult process. Once I tried reporting a cybercrime, a laptop was purchased on EBay but the seller took my money and never sent the laptop, this is a common case of auction fraud. I did try to make a complain, the whole process was extremely slow, the officer dealing with me had no clue what EBay is, I was able to register a complaint but it has been two years and my complain is still unresolved. Under-reporting is factor which contributes towards increase in cybercrime, under-reporting mean that criminals will have less fear of getting caught and therefore, they are more likely to commit illegal acts online. People’s attitude towards cybercrime Traditional crimes such as murder, rape and robbery can have serious effects on the victim’s life; in some cases the victim may not be able to lead a normal life after being a victim of crime. In contrast to cybercrime, the impact is not that serious, majority of users have insurance against financial frauds, and frauds are usually of low-value. Viruses can easily be filtered using antivirus software. Other offences such as cyberstalking usually cause some anxiety and distress. Only crimes such as child pornography have a greater impact, it is the only the crime which can have a serious consequences on the victims life. A recent survey suggest that only 37% are afraid to use the internet after being a victim of crime, majority of the users do continue to use the internet after being a victim. Cybercrime and e-commerce Cybercrime is a growing concern for all of us, however, the effects of cybercrime are not hindering the growth of the internet, and the effects of cybercrime on the e-commerce have not been drastic. Financial transactions over the internet are on the rise, number of people using internet for shopping is increase day by day and over one third of population is using internet banking. One of the reasons why cybercrime spiraling out of control is the fact that it is very easy to commit if have the technical knowledge, all you need is a computer connected to the internet, the crimes on the internet are hard to detect. It can be committed from anywhere in the world, the criminal could sitting in Africa and targeting his victim in Australia. In the next chapter, we shall examine the problems faced by authorities when investigating cybercrime. Jurisdiction Jurisdictional issues and the cyberspace Cyberspace is a world without defined boundaries; anyone can access any website using his computer. It can very difficult to locate the source of crime in cyberspace because relative anonymity and as easy way to shield identity. Even if the relevant authorities are able to identify the source of crime, it is not always easy to prosecute the criminal. Double criminality When dealing cross border crime, it is imperative that both countries should recognise the conduct as illegal in both jurisdictions. The principle of double criminality prohibits the extradition of a person, if the conduct in question is not recognized as a criminal offence by the country receiving the request for jurisdiction. Imagine a situation where a computer programmer from Zimbabwe sends Barclays bank a virus which causes the computers in Barclays bank to malfunction, the bank cannot carry out their business for 1 hour and as a result they lose about $1 million worth of revenue. English authorities would want to extradite the offender to England so they could prosecute the offender. In an action for extradition, the applicant is required to show that actions of the accused constitute a criminal offence exceeding a minimum level of seriousness in both jurisdictions. Imagine now that they are no laws on spreading viruses in Zimbabwe, therefore it will not possible to show offender’s action constitute as criminal behavior. If they are no laws regarding on cybercrime in Zimbabwe then he cannot be extradited and he will walk free after deliberately causing damage to Barclays bank. Cybercrime has an international dimension, it is imperative that legal protection is harmonised internationally. There are still about 33 countries such as Albania, Yugoslavia and Malta; they have no laws on cybercrimes. If there are no laws then those countries are considered as computer crime havens. The perpetrator of ‘I LOVE YOU’ virus which caused $8.5 billion worth damage was caught in Philippines but he could not be prosecuted as Philippines had no laws on cybercrime. Cybercrime is global issue and the world will need to work together in order to tackle cybercrime. How real world crime dealt across borders? In relation to real world crime which transcended national borders, an idiosyncratic network of Mutual Legal Assistance Treaties(MLATs) bound various countries to assist each other in investigating real world crime, such as drug trafficking. If there was no treaty agreement between two countries then they would contact the relevant authorities to ask for assistance and obtain evidence, this mechanism was sufficient in dealing with real world crime. This mechanism can only work if both countries have similar cybercrime laws; if any country lacks cybercrime laws then the process would fail. How should Jurisdiction be approached in Cybercrime? In a case of cyberstalking, An Australian man was stalking a Canadian Actress. The man harassed the actress by sending unsolicited emails. Australian Supreme Court of Victoria held that crimes ‘committed over the internet knows no borders’ and ‘State and national boundaries do not concern them’, therefore, jurisdiction should not be the issue. He was convicted. This case was straightforward as both nations recognise stalking as a criminal offence, however, there can be conflicts if both nations do not recognize the act as criminal. In Licra v Yahoo, French courts tried to exercise jurisdiction over an American company. Yahoo was accused of Nazi memorabilia contrary to Article R645-1 of the French Criminal Code. Yahoo argued that there are not in breach of Article R645-1 as they were conducting the auction under the jurisdiction of USA and it is not illegal to sell Nazi memorabilia under the American law. In order to prove that Yahoo is subject American jurisdiction, they argued the following points: Yahoo servers are located in US territory. Services of Yahoo are primarily aimed at US citizens. According to the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, freedom of speech and expression is guaranteed and any attempt to enforce judgement which restricts freedom of speech and expression would fail for unconstitutionality. The court ruled that they have full jurisdiction over Yahoo because: The auction was open to worldwide bidders, including France. It is possible to view the auction in France, viewing and displaying Nazi memorabilia causes public nuisance and it is offence to public nuisance under the French law. Yahoo had a customer base in France, the advertisements were in French. Yahoo did have knowledge that French citizens use their site; therefore they should not do anything to offend French citizens. Yahoo ignored the French court ruling and kept saying that they French court does not have the right to exercise jurisdiction over an American company. Yahoo was warned that they would have to pay heavy fines if they don’t comply. In the end Yahoo owners did comply with the judgement they had substantial assets in France which were at risk of being confiscated if they don’t claim. The sole reason why French courts were able to exercise jurisdiction over Yahoo because it is a multinational company with large presence in France. Imagine instead of France, if the action would have been taken by courts of Saudi Arabia on auctioning playboy magazines, under the Saudi Arabian Sharia law, it is illegal to view or buy pornography. Saudi Arabia court would have failed to exercise jurisdiction over Yahoo as they don’t have any presence in Saudi Arabia but it was possible to view Yahoo auctions from Saudi Arabia. The case of Yahoo is a rare example where a court was able to exercise jurisdiction over a foreign company. In majority of the cases concerning individuals, courts trying to exercise jurisdiction over foreign elements are usually ignored. In the case of Nottinghamshire County Council v. Gwatkin (UK), injunctions were issued against many journalists to prevent them from publishing disseminating a leaked report that strongly criticises [the Councils] handling of allegations of satanic abuse of children in the 1980s. Despite the injunctions, a report appeared on an American website. The website refused to respect the English jurisdiction as they argued that the report was a public document. The Nottinghamshire had no option then to drop the case. Cybercrime has an international dimension. International law is complicated area, it can be very difficult to co-operate with authorities if there is no or weak diplomatic ties, for e.g. Pakistan and Israel have no diplomatic ties, if a situation arises where Israeli citizen hacks into State bank of Pakistan steals millions of dollars from the bank, in a situation like this, one easily assume that both countries would not co-operate with each other even though both countries recognise hacking as a offence but they do not have diplomatic ties with each other, most probably the hacker would get away with the crime. A case involving Russian hackers, they hacked into Paypal and stole 53,000 credit card details. Paypal is an American company. The Russian hackers blackmailed Paypal and asked for a substantial amount of money, they threatened they would publish the details of 53,000 credit cards if they do not receive the money. Russia and American both have signed extradition treaty but still Russian authorities failed to take action, it is still not clear why they did not take appropriate action against the Russian hackers. Both nations struggled to gain jurisdiction over each other. FBI decided to take things into their own hands by setting up a secret operation, undercover agents posed as reprenstatives of a bogus security firm Invita. The bogus security firm invited the Russian hackers to US with prospects of employment. When the interview for employment by the bogus firm Invita was being carried out, the Russian hackers were asked to display there hacking skills, one of the hackers accessed his own system in Russia to show off his skills, the FBI recorded every keystroke and later arrested the Russian hackers for multiple offences such as hacking, fraud and extortion. The keystrokes recorded were later used to hack into one of the hacker’s computer in Russia to access incriminating evidence. All this took place without the knowledge of Russian authorities. When Russian authorities came to know about whole incident, they were furious and argued that US misused their authority and infringing on another sovereign nation’s jurisdiction. Lack of co-operation in relation to jurisdiction can lead to serious problems between nations, in order to avoid such conflicts, there is need to address the jurisdiction issue and come up with a mechanism which ensures that countries co-operate with each other. Where is the Jurisdiction? In the real world crime, the conduct and the effect of the conduct are easy to pin down because we can visibly see the human carrying out the conduct and the effect of the conduct is also visible. The location of the offence and the location of the perpetrator can easily be identified. Imagine a situation in which a shooter in Canada shots an American across Niagara Falls, it is clear from the example that the conduct took place in Canada and the effect of the conduct took place in Canada. Cyberspace is not real, people say that events on cyberspace occur everywhere and nowhere, a man disseminating a virus could release a virus which travel through servers of many different country before reaching the victim, for e.g. a person makes a racist website targeting Jews in Malta, uploads the website on American servers and the website is available for everyone to see, a Jewish living in Israel comes across the website and gets offended. In a situation like this where would you bring an action, should you bring an action in Malta because the perpetrator is based over there, would bring an action in America where the server is hosted or would bring the action in Israel where the victim is? There are specific laws regarding jurisdiction issues on the internet, the world is still struggling to come up with a solution which would solve the problem of jurisdiction. Positive or Negative Jurisdiction? The principle of negative jurisdiction occurs when no country is willing to exercise jurisdiction for a cybercrime. Cybercrime can have multiple victims in different countries; the ‘love bug’ caused damage in many different countries including USA, UK, France and Germany. If the damage is caused to multiple countries then who should claim jurisdiction over the cybercrime, should it by prioritised by the amount of damage suffered by each country. If the effected countries decide not to take action against the perpetrator because it is not in their best interest, the country may be occupied by other internal problems. If no country is willing to exercise jurisdiction over a cybercrime then the perpetrator would walk free. Positive jurisdiction is opposite of negative jurisdiction, how will the issue of jurisdiction be decided if more than two countries want to exercise t