The Global Employer Magazine: 2015 Review and 2016 Preview

2015 was another busy year in terms of legal changes and developments around the world. In this 2015 Review and 2016 Preview edition of the Global Employer Magazine we summarize some of these important changes. In the 2015 Review of developments and trends tables below we have set out some of the main developments that took place in 2015 and provided recommended actions or tips on how employers should operate in light of these developments in 2016. For some countries, instead of covering developments, we have referred to trends that we saw in 2015 and again, set out some actions to help employers deal with these trends in the relevant country in 2016. In the 2016 Preview of important forthcoming changes tables, we preview pending legislation and case developments for which employers should stay tuned . Please note that, as there were so many developments, we haven\u27t been able to cover them all. Instead, we have chosen some of the most important or interesting developments. Where possible, we have also added a general impact rating to help show the significance of some of the developments, with 5 being a very significant or important development. Of course, the significance and importance of the development is subject to each employer\u27s circumstances. In addition, some of the entries don\u27t have a rating due to the fact that they include only general commentary on developments, trends or potential political changes. The information below is provided by region in the following order: Asia Pacific, Europe Middle East & Africa, Latin America and North America

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse

The Global Employer: 2015 Review and 2016 Preview

2015 was another busy year in terms of legal changes and developments around the world. In this 2015 Review and 2016 Preview edition of the Global Employer Magazine we summarize some of these important changes. In the 2015 Review of developments and trends tables below we have set out some of the main developments that took place in 2015 and provided recommended actions or tips on how employers should operate in light of these developments in 2016. For some countries, instead of covering developments, we have referred to trends that we saw in 2015 and again, set out some actions to help employers deal with these trends in the relevant country in 2016. In the 2016 Preview of important forthcoming changes tables, we preview pending legislation and case developments for which employers should stay tuned . Please note that, as there were so many developments, we haven\u27t been able to cover them all. Instead, we have chosen some of the most important or interesting developments. Where possible, we have also added a general impact rating to help show the significance of some of the developments, with 5 being a very significant or important development. Of course, the significance and importance of the development is subject to each employer\u27s circumstances. In addition, some of the entries don\u27t have a rating due to the fact that they include only general commentary on developments, trends or potential political changes. The information below is provided by region in the following order: Asia Pacific, Europe Middle East & Africa, Latin America and North America

E-Government Implementation Challenges at Local Level: A Citizens\u27 Centric Perspective

Majority of the studies reported in e-government literature identify the challenges involved in any e-government implementation from technical or project implementation perspective. In contrast, in this study, we take the citizen centric perspective to identify the factors and issues that influence the success of e-government implementation at local level. In this paper, we report the findings of a case study of e-government implementation undertaken recently at a local government authority in the UK. We conducted the study in two phases. During the first phase, we interviewed operational and managerial staff members at a local government authority in the UK who were involved with the e-government implementation. In the second phase, we interviewed 88 citizens to understand the issues and perceptions about e-government services available to them. We use the design-reality gap analysis framework based on seven \u27ITPOSMO\u27 dimensions proposed by Heeks to compare and contrast the issues from citizens‟ perspective and those from government perspective. Our findings indicate that the success of e-government at local level requires a strong partnership between local government and citizens. The study results point to lack of clear strategy at local authorities‟ level for changing the way the government interacts with citizens. This paper contributes to our understanding of issues involved in implementing e-government at local level both from citizens‟ perspective and government perspective

China’s Data Privacy Regulations: A Tricky Trade-Off between ICT’s Productive Utilization and Cyber-Control

China's data privacy laws and regulations reflect the tension it faces between using modern information and communications technologies (ICTs) to maintain unity and stability via cybercontrol and using them to stimulate economic growth and productivity. The evolution of China's data privacy regulations and policies and their impact on provisioning and use of cloud computing and other IT services are substantial. They deserve close examination by IT service providers and users as well as IT professionals in China and other countries

Businesses Blogging and the Effects of Non-Compliance

Presently, business blogging is gaining increasing on-line popularity. Some bloggers or business owners engage in this form of business for limited periods to test the marketability of their products, while others rely on it as the primary medium for marketing their products and services. Given that commerce is being conducted via blogs, some exploit this medium for fraudulent purposes. In Malaysia, there are legal rules and regulations governing online transactions or electronic commerce. However, to date these have not been updated to include specific provisions for business blogging. The legal issues that arise are whether owners of such commercial blogs should comply with the existing legal framework governing online transactions or electronic commerce and are thus liable to consumers under consumer laws. This paper discusses the above issues by examining the application of existing laws on business blogging and the effects of non-compliance

Data Nationalism

A BRICS Internet, the Euro Cloud, the Iranian ¿Halal¿ Internet: Governments across the world eager to increase control over the World Wide Web are tearing it apart. Iran seeks to develop an Internet free of Western influences or domestic dissent. The Australian government places restrictions on health data leaving the country. Russia requires personal information to be stored domestically. Vietnam insists on a local copy of all Vietnamese data. The last century¿s nontariff barriers to goods have reappeared as firewalls blocking international services. Legitimate global anxieties over surveillance and security are justifying governmental measures that break apart the World Wide Web, without enhancing either privacy or security. The issue is critical to the future of international trade and development, and even to the ongoing struggle between democracy and totalitarianism. The theory of this Article expands the conversation about international Internet regulation from efforts to prevent data from flowing in to a country through censorship, to include efforts to prevent data from flowing out through data localization. A simple formula helps demonstrate what is stake: censorship + data localization = total control