An Analysis of Settlement Risk Contagion in Alternative Securities Settlement Architecture

This paper compares the so-called gross and net architectures for securities settlement. It studies the settlement risk arising from exogenous operational delays and compares the importance of settlement failures under the two architectures, as a function of the length of the settlement cycle and of different market conditions. Under both architectures, settlement failures are non-monotonically related to the length of settlement cycle. There is no evidence that continuous time settlement provides always higher stability. Gross systems appear to be more stable than net systems

Network-based business process management: embedding business logic in communications networks

Advanced Business Process Management (BPM) tools enable the decomposition of previously integrated and often ill-defined processes into re-usable process modules. These process modules can subsequently be distributed on the Internet over a variety of many different actors, each with their own specialization and economies-of-scale. The economic benefits of process specialization can be huge. However, how should such actors in a business network find, select, and control, the best partner for what part of the business process, in such a way that the best result is achieved? This particular management challenge requires more advanced techniques and tools in the enabling communications networks. An approach has been developed to embed business logic into the communications networks in order to optimize the allocation of business resources from a network point of view. Initial experimental results have been encouraging while at the same time demonstrating the need for more robust techniques in a future of massively distributed business processes.active networks;business process management;business protocols;embedded business logic;genetic algorithms;internet distributed process management;payment systems;programmable networks;resource optimization

A cooperative cellular and broadcast conditional access system for Pay-TV systems

This is the author's accepted manuscript. The final published article is available from the link below. Copyright @ 2009 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other users, including reprinting/ republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted components of this work in other works.The lack of interoperability between Pay-TV service providers and a horizontally integrated business transaction model have compromised the competition in the Pay-TV market. In addition, the lack of interactivity with customers has resulted in high churn rate and improper security measures have contributed into considerable business loss. These issues are the main cause of high operational costs and subscription fees in the Pay-TV systems. As a result, this paper presents the Mobile Conditional Access System (MICAS) as an end-to-end access control solution for Pay-TV systems. It incorporates the mobile and broadcasting systems and provides a platform whereby service providers can effectively interact with their customers, personalize their services and adopt appropriate security measurements. This would result in the decrease of operating expenses and increase of customers' satisfaction in the system. The paper provides an overview of state-of-the-art conditional access solutions followed by detailed description of design, reference model implementation and analysis of possible MICAS security architectures.Strategy & Technology (S&T) Lt

An analysis of systemic risk in alternative securities settlement architectures

This paper compares securities settlement gross and netting architectures. It studies settlement risk arising from exogenous operational delays and compares settlement failures between the two architectures as functions of the length of the settlement interval under different market conditions. While settlement failures are non monotonically related to the length of settlement cycles under both architectures, there is no clear cut ranking of which architecture delivers greater stability. We show that while, on average, netting systems seem to be more stable than gross systems, rare events may lead to contagious defaults that could affect the all system. Furthermore netting system are very sensitive to the number and initial distribution of traded shares. JEL Classification: C6, D4, G20, O33gross and net systems, Security clearing and settlement, systemic risk

Individual Risk Management for Digital Payment Systems

Despite existing security standards and security technologies, such as secure hardware, gaps between users’ demand for security and the security offered by a payment system can still remain. These security gaps imply risks for users. In this paper, we introduce a framework for the management of those risks. As a result, we present an instrument enabling users to evaluate eventual risks related with digital payment systems and to handle these risks with technical and economic instruments.Payment Systems, Digital Money

Challenges in the delivery of e-government through kiosks

Kiosks are increasingly being heralded as a technology through which governments, government departments and local authorities or municipalities can engage with citizens. In particular, they have attractions in their potential to bridge the digital divide. There is some evidence to suggest that the citizen uptake of kiosks and indeed other channels for e-government, such as web sites, is slow, although studies on the use of kiosks for health information provision offer some interesting perspectives on user behaviour with kiosk technology. This article argues that the delivery of e-government through kiosks presents a number of strategic challenges, which will need to be negotiated over the next few years in order that kiosk applications are successful in enhancing accessibility to and engagement with e-government. The article suggests that this involves consideration of: the applications to be delivered through a kiosk; one stop shop service and knowledge architectures; mechanisms for citizen identification; and, the integration of kiosks within the total interface between public bodies and their communities. The article concludes by outlining development and research agendas in each of these areas.</p