Overview of Question: Please give comprehensive responses (lengthy and in-depth, like an essay response in an exam) Resources: Provide information that supports your answer

DQ1 - What do you think are the societal impacts of e-commerce?

Overview:

E-commerce has affected the middle man and has allowed direct trade with consumers. Efficiency brings about lower prices for the consumer, but it is more accurate to argue that efficiency brings about greater wealth for shareholders, directors and owners. The intrinsic weave of social interactions of trade, can be disentangled and made into a horizontal supply chain. E-commerce has create efficiencies that effectively remove the need for a long supply chain but at the expense of social relationships.

The effect of e-commerce, and the internet will impact on every society on the earth. Already, the barriers of trade between individuals in different countries are non-existent. Company contact details are searchable through powerful search engines, and trade can commerce between two individuals who would otherwise never have met. The internet dissolves national boundaries, and the consequences for cities that have developed as centers of administration and trade will be disastrous, if they do not embrace the technological advances in communication and trade that the internet brings. While at the same time, free trade means fierce competition without the protection of award wages. People are reduced to consumers and suppliers.

Although primarily an economic phenomenon, electronic commerce forms part of a broader process of social change, characterised by the globalisation of markets, the shift towards an economy based on knowledge and information, and the growing prominence of all forms of technology in everyday life. These major societal transformations are now under way and will probably continue far into the foreseeable future. As both a product and manifestation of such transformations, electronic commerce is being shaped by, and increasingly will help to shape, modern society as a whole. Societal factors will thus have a profound influence on its future development. They will also merit attention from a public policy standpoint, both to establish the social conditions that allow electronic commerce to reach its full economic potential and to ensure that its benefits are realised by society as a whole.

The "death of distance" (Cairncross, 1997) that is intrinsic to information networking is probably the single most important economic force shaping society at the dawn of the 21st century. Both for individual citizens and for businesses, affordable access to the information infrastructure has become a necessity for effective participation in a knowledge-based economy and society (IHAC, 1997). Access to the Internet in particular has become a critical enabler of electronic commerce, since it has emerged as the dominant platform for a wide range of information and transactional services associated with business-to-business as well as business-to-consumer applications.

Computer and information technologies have begun to make a significant contribution to strengthening the social infrastructure through improvements in education, health, and other aspects of human resource development, including the sense of community. The technologies and applications associated with electronic commerce, such as "smart cards", automated payment systems, and electronic information, can play an important role in the organisation and delivery of such services. These tools will increasingly be used by both the public and private sector as a means of improving and expanding services to the public.

Electronic commerce and ICTs abolish distance and alter the concept of community. Many of these changes are positive - creating links with new people, maintaining closer ties with far-flung friends and family members, and creating new online communities with potentially global membership. There are potential costs as well, such as those incurred in some countries with the arrival of automobile dependent suburban shopping malls and the demise of urban pedestrian shopping. Likewise, as firms' production facilities and customer base become global, their loyalty to a particular area is likely to erode. There are concerns that because of the new technology, people will no longer have to live in built-up regions and urban centres will decline (ActivMedia, 1998). However, as much of the infrastructure for effective high-bandwidth communication is found in the traditional built-up areas, a technology-driven exodus from the city is unlikely in the near future. Cyber-links may allow some rural communities to strengthen their social and economic situation and reverse lower growth trends and shrinking populations.

In general, electronic commerce and ICTs tend to reduce the need for direct physical interaction between people. More time and research will be needed to see to what extent people are willing to
forego such interaction and to see the broader economic and social implications.

Resource: http://www.passioncomputing.com.au/Articles/The_Social_Impact_of_Technology.aspx
http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/3/12/1944883.pdf

(Kindly note that the above mentioned links, especially the OECD link, is a very extensive source for this question and can be referred for more information)

DQ2 - What Laws do you think need to be implemented to improve e-commerce, or is e-commerce ok the way it is today?

Overview:

Even though ecommerce is progressing and expanding at a very rapid rate and the growth has been phenomenal, there are many areas which still needs to be improved for capturing the maximum benefits and utility of ecommerce. One such area is the legal and regulatory aspects of ecommerce. In spite of the presence of ecommerce or cyber laws, they are not enforced in a very strict manner, which results in occurrence of numerous cyber crimes such as invasion of privacy, theft of confidential information such as financial information, misuse of financial information, copyright related misuse, misuse of personal data such as those being sold to third party vendors by ecommerce companies without permission,etc. Thus, ecommerce is definitely not perfect or OK the way it is today and lot of improvement still needs to be done to capture its maximum potential for the benefits of both the sellers as well as buyers.

Even though laws exist in above mentioned areas, they are not strictly enforced all around the world, thereby leading to illegal practices in ecommerce.

Global phenomena like cyber-crimes should in principle propel nations to achieve legislative co-operation and partnership at international levels, since cyber-space is no respecter of national boundaries. The nature and extent of the problem in enforcing the laws over the cyberspace is enormous. Some law enforcement agencies are responding aggressively, others are not fully aware of the problem on the cyberspace and lack the expertise and resources to pursue the kind of cases appearing everyday. Some ISPs have taken affirmative actions to crackdown on cyber offenders, whilst others have not. There is a great deal more that government and/or industry can and should do to empower individuals to protect themselves against cyber offenders and other online threats.

If the current laws are inadequate to deal with the problems, national governments and / or appropriate regional and international bodies need to either revise the existing laws or enact new laws to provide individual, corporate and government users with maximum trust and security.

Cyber-law enforcement is relatively a new challenge for the most enforcement agencies. Many countries do not have necessary skilled law enforcement personnel to deal with computer and even broader Information technology related crimes. This undercuts the efforts to battle the growing threats like cyber-crimes.

In view of the fact that cyber-crimes are growing at alarming rate, each country by all stakeholders needs to have more pragmatic approaches (as below) at national, regional and international levels: e.g.,

Ø Raise awareness of serious nature of the cyber-crimes for various target groups from individuals, industries, and governments to specific enforcement agencies.

Ø Revise, enact and enforce national and international laws specifying various substantive and procedural aspects of issues emerging from cyber-space: i.e., cyber-crimes.

Ø Harmonize different national laws to regulate and police the cyber-crimes in a consistent and collective manner at various jurisdictional aspects.

Ø Coordinate and cooperate between and among the law enforcement agencies of one's own country as well as other countries concerned.

Ø Endeavor to establish International Tribunals to regulate cyber cases or crimes increased beyond national jurisdictions.

Resource: http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/egov/ifip/dec2004/article2.htm

DQ3 - How do you think that Americans should manage the ethical and legal implications of e-commerce when dealing with countries that do not have the same consumer protections as America?

Overview:

First of all, US companies should maintain consistency in terms of their ethical and legal policies, irrespective of their location of business. In other words, even if an American company is dealing in a country which has relaxed or weak ecommerce laws and ethical standards, they should not try to take undue advantage of such weak laws and should maintain the same standards as they would do in a country like US where ecommerce laws and ethical practices are relatively strong.

They should focus on achieving highest possible standards in terms of legal and ethical issues such as customer security and privacy, compliance to cyber laws, copyright related issues, etc.

This will enhance the corporate image of the company and would instill more confidence among its target customers. By maintaining double standards in terms of ethical and legal practices, US based ecommerce companies will jeopardize their goodwill and will not be considered good corporate citizens. Thus, they should become self-regulatory and should strive to maintain good ethical and legal standards on their own.

Resource: No resource has been used.