The Roles of Security and Trust: Comparing Cloud Computing and Banking

AbstractThe evolution of information technology (IT) – related to Web, servers and data – and their capabilities have brought cloud computing to the forefront. While cloud computing in recent years has energized the information systems professional community, it has now embarked on information systems research arena as a prevalent topic for integrated information and systems. Organizations of all sizes are keen on understanding this intriguing yet potentially risky IT artifact as they see it to be a game changer in terms of the way their current and future computing needs could potentially be met. However, they also are skeptical and concerned about the security, trust and privacy issues related to its adoption. In this study we identify the roles of security and trust in cloud computing environments from the perspective of organizations who would entrust their private information to the cloud computing providers. We compare cloud computing and banking since to both security and trust is of vital importance for their service users and providers. For any new technology such as cloud computing trust is not easily established, it gradually builds based on providers’ reputation for good performance and security, earning users’ trust over time. The clients must trust the cloud providers just like they would be willing to trust banks to put their money into them. Similarly, the cloud providers must demonstrate that they are reliable and trustworthy. Therefore for widespread adoption of cloud computing, we contend that customers should be able to store their data in the cloud with same confidence as they store their money and other valuables in the banks today. To help study and address the roles of security and trust further, we provide technological, regulatory, and behavioral recommendations for consideration

Exploring Users’ Security-related Fact-Checking Behavior in Educational Social Media Groups: The Perspective of Health Belief Model

Social media services have become increasingly prevalent among educators as a means to enhance their educational effectiveness. The group feature in these services, which allows multiple users to communicate within a shared space, has been extensively incorporated into the teaching process. Unfortunately, information security threats and risks have appeared along with the popularity of educational social media groups. In this study, we are conducting exploratory research to investigate the antecedents of users’ security-related fact-checking behavior in teacher-parent social media groups based on the health belief model. A cross-sectional survey will be conducted to test our proposed research model and the data will be collected from WeChat users. We are expecting to make several contributions to the current literature on educational social media usage and behavioral information security

A MULTI-THEORETICAL STUDY ON SOCIAL NETWORKING TOURISM

In this paper, we study factors that may influence users’ continued use intentions of social networking tourism sites. We develop and test a multi-theoretical model based on the theory of planned behavior, self-determination theory, and social capital theory. The study combines qualitative and quantitative methods. Qualitative method is being used through interviews to explore the factors that motivate continued use intention, followed by the use of quantitative method through survey-based empirical analysis to evaluate the proposed multi-theoretical research model. This research in progress paper reports results from the qualitative study and preliminary findings of the quantitative study. The final reports will be presented at the PACIS conference

Why patients switch help from online to offline: An empirical investigation of emotions and effects of cognitions

People have different reactions when they encounter different levels of health threats. Individual cognitions towards the seriousness of health threat and emotions arise from health threats often motivate people to seek help online and offline. To examine the effects of cognitions and emotions on help seeking behaviors on different levels of health threats, we propose a research model based on protection motivation theory and cognition-emotion-behavior framework. Empirical data were collected through questionnaires and analyzed by Smart PLS. The results show that perceived susceptibility and perceived severity have positive significant influence on fear which leads on anxiety. Perceived health knowledge has negative influence on anxiety. Fear and anxiety can motivate individuals to seek help online and offline, especially in the high health threats condition. In addition, fear has significant influence on help seeking offline while anxiety has significant influence on help seeking online. Expectation confirmation has different effects on help seeking offline in different levels of health threats. This study extends PMT through the lens of cognition-emotion-behavior framework, and it expands research scope to help seeking behaviors

Why Individual Employees Commit Malicious Computer Abuse: A Routine Activity Theory Perspective

Prior information security studies have largely focused on understanding employee security behavior from a policy compliance perspective. We contend that there is a pressing need to develop a comprehensive understanding of the circumstances that lead to employee commitment of deliberate and malicious acts against organizational digital assets. Drawing on routine activity theory (RAT), we seek to establish a comprehensive model of employee-committed malicious computer abuse (MCA) by investigating the motivations of the offenders, the suitability of the desired targets, and the effect of security guardianship in organizational settings. Specifically, we delineate the effects of the individual characteristics of self-control, hacking self-efficacy, and moral beliefs, as well as the organizational aspects of deterrence based on the routine activity framework of crime. We tested this research model using research participants holding a wide range of corporate positions and possessing varying degrees of computer skills. Our findings offer fresh insights on insider security threats, identify new directions for future research, and provide managers with prescriptive guidance for formulating effective security policies and management programs for preventing MCA in organizations

Incentives, Positive Emotions and SWOM Intention: Moderating Roles of Allocation Type and Emotion Regulation

With the increasing popularity of social networking sites (SNS), companies are adopting monetary incentives to generate eWOM on SNS (SWOM). Drawing on emotion and equity theories, this study explores effects of perceived magnitude of monetary incentives and emotions on consumer SWOM intention. In addition, this study investigates the moderating effects of allocation types of rewards (positive inequity and negative inequity) and emotion regulation (reappraisal and suppression emotion regulation) on these relationships. An online situational experiment was conducted and yielded valid responses from 193 WeChat users in China. With the preliminary data, we tested the direct, mediation, and moderation effects using SmartPLS 3.0. The empirical results show that (1) perceived monetary incentives have a positive effect on SWOM intention; (2) positive emotions of senders mediates the relationship between incentives and SWOM intention; (3) negative-inequity incentives negatively moderates the relationship between incentives and positive emotion, while the moderating effect of positive-inequity incentives is insignificant on the relationship between incentives and positive emotion; (4) reappraisal emotion regulation strengthens the effect of positive emotion on SWOM intention, whereas the moderating effect of suppression emotion regulation between positive emotion and SWOM intention is not statistically significant

The Domain Name System—Past, Present, and Future

The Domain Name System (DNS) is a critical component of the global Internet infrastructure. Throughout its history, its design and administration has experienced significant dynamic changes as the Internet itself has evolved. The history of the DNS is divided into six eras, based on underlying technological and administrative themes within each era. Developments in its governance, its application, and in other factors are discussed. Future directions for DNS use and abuse are explored, along with challenges in its future governance. Finally, a proposed research model is included to guide future study of the DNS evolution and its influences from political, legal, psychological, sociological, and technological perspectives

THE VALUE OF CHIEF DATA OFFICER PRESENCE ON FIRM PERFORMANCE

In the era of big data, there are more and more organizations trying to establish a new breed of executive, Chief Data Officer (CDO), to identify new business opportunity from data assets and optimize corporate revenue. However, the relationship between CDO presence and firm’s financial performance has not been rigorously studied and validated in literature. Based on upper echelon theory and strategic change perspectives, we examined the impact of pre-performance on the CDO appointment, as well as the CDO presence on post-performance. We collected a multi-industry dataset of 68 firms with a CDO position. The results show that the return on assets (ROA) is positively related to CDO appointment, while, market to book ratio (M/B) is negatively related to CDO appointment. In addition, we found that firms with CDO have superior financial performance than their peers who do not. This study provides an initial step towards understanding the empirical linkages between CDO presence and firm performance

Method for Prioritizing Urban Pesticides for Monitoring

Environmental Monitoring Branch (EM) is to monitor pesticide residues in surface waters with urban runoff inputs. Recent monitoring efforts have identified urban runoff as a major contributor of pesticides to California surface waters (Ensminger et al., 2012). Pesticide use is i