Technology

Emerging Innovations in the Online World

Owing to the application of technology, our standard of living has increased. Our needs are met with greater ease. Technology has brought advancements in agriculture, due to which food produce has increased. Owing to the developments in engineering and architecture, building robust civil structures has been possible. Technology has boosted every industry. Businesses have grown, creating more employment opportunities. Advancements in technology have led to the evolution of newer and faster modes of transport and communication. The application of technology has boosted research in fields ranging from genetics to extraterrestrial space. The computer and Internet technologies are ubiquitous. They have changed every sector; be it medicine, tourism, education, entertainment or any other. Technology has touched every aspect of life, making it easier, better and different. Technology has changed living.

⇒Global Positioning System

The Global Positioning System(GPS),originally Navstar GPS, is a space-based radio navigation system owned by the United States government. It is a global navigation system that provides time information to a GPS receiver anywhere on or near the Earth where there is an unobstructed line of sight to four or more GPS satellites.

The GPS does not require the user to transmit any data, and it operates independently of any telephonic or internet reception, though these technologies can enhance the usefulness of the GPS positioning information. The GPS provides critical positioning capabilities to military, civil, and commercial users around the world. The United States government created the system, maintains it, and makes it freely accessible to anyone with a GPS receiver.

The GPS project was launched by the U.S. Department of Defense in 1973 for use by the United States military and became fully operational in 1995. It was allowed for civilian use in the 1980s. Advances in technology and new demands on the existing system have now led to efforts to modernize the GPS and implement the next generation of GPS Block IIIA satellites and Next Generation Operational Control System (OCX). Announcements from Vice President Al Gore and the White House in 1998 initiated these changes. In 2000, the U.S. Congress authorized the modernization effort.

       

  

                                                                                        

⇒Electronic Publishing

Electronic publishing includes the digital publication of e-books, digital magazines, and the development of digital libraries and catalogs. Electronic publishing has become common in scientific publishing where it has been argued that scientific journals are in the process of being replaced by electronic publishing. It is also becoming common to distribute books, magazines, and newspapers to consumers through tablet reading devices, a market that is growing by millions each year, generated by online vendors such as Apple's iTunes bookstore, Amazon's bookstore for Kindle, and books in the Google Play Bookstore. Market research suggests that half of all magazine and newspaper circulation will be via digital delivery by the end of 2015 and that half of all reading in the United States will be done without paper by 2015.

The electronic publishing process follows some aspects of the traditional paper-based publishing process but differs from traditional publishing in two ways: 

1) it does not include using an offset printing press to print the final product 

2) it avoids the distribution of a physical product (e.g., paper books, paper magazines, or paper newspapers). Because the content is electronic, it may be distributed over the Internet and through electronic bookstores, and users can read the material on a range of electronic and digital devices, including desktop computers, laptops, tablet computers, smartphones or e-reader tablets. The consumer may read the published content online a website, in an application on a tablet device, or in a PDF document on a computer. 

                                                                 

⇒Online Banking

Online banking, also known as internet banking, e-banking or virtual banking, is an electronic payment system that enables customers of a bank or other financial institution to conduct a range of financial transactions through the financial institution's website. The online banking system will typically connect to or be part of the core banking system operated by a bank and is in contrast to branch banking which was the traditional way customers accessed banking services.

There are some advantages on using e-banking both for banks and customers:

- Permanent access to the bank
- Lower transaction costs / general cost reductions

- Access anywhere using mobile or computer

- Less time consuming

- Very safe and secure method

- Helps to transfer the money immediately and accurately

- Easy to use

Attacks on online banking used today are based on deceiving the user to steal login data and valid TANs. Two well known examples for those attacks are phishing and pharming. Cross-site scripting and keylogger/Trojan horses can also be used to steal login information.

A method to attack signature based online banking methods is to manipulate the used software in a way, that correct transactions are shown on the screen and faked transactions are signed in the background.A 2008 U.S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Technology Incident Report, compiled from suspicious activity reports banks file quarterly, lists 536 cases of computer intrusion, with an average loss per incident of $30,000. That adds up to a nearly $16-million loss in the second quarter of 2007. Computer intrusions increased by 150 percent between the first quarter of 2007 and the second. In 80 percent of the cases, the source of the intrusion is unknown but it occurred during online banking, the report states.