Radio has always been a good brand builder for the marketer. Now it is beginning to
offer additional routes via new syndication and content deals which, in turn, may mean
new programmes which means new sponsorship opportunities, and even new radio sta-
tion opportunities. Some radio stations now offer audio ads with a banner ad or ‘buy
now’ button when listening to web radio – you hear the ad, you click the button. Web
radio also offers to do partner deals delivering niche radio to other web sites. This adds
to the branding and also offers new revenue-generating channels as affiliates share ad
revenues and merchandise sales from the partner web radio company.
Another benefit of web radio is that, as with traditional radio, there is already a dia-
logue – people phone in, e-mail in and snail-mail in. Today, they can click and respond
instantaneously, continuing the conversation later or joining in a group discussion.
Security
We now focus on security technology, which is, like privacy, a major concern for
Internet users. Security fears are a major barrier to e-commerce adoption, by both busi-
nesses and consumers. When a customer of an e-commerce site enters their credit card
details, these are typically stored on servers of the merchant (retailer) of the third party.
Once here, they are vulnerable to downloading by hackers who can use the numbers for
fraudulent purchase. Customers may lose the first £50, if the credit card issuer does not
cover them, but for larger amounts the risk lies with the credit card issuer. As a result,
Internet-related fraud is now the largest source of fraud affecting credit card companies
such as Visa and Mastercard. To summarise we can identify the following security risks
from the customer or merchant perspective:
A transaction or credit card details stolen in transit;
B customer’s credit card details stolen from merchant’s server;
C merchant or customer are not who they claim to be.
In this section we assess the measures that can be taken to reduce the risk of these
breaches of e-commerce security. We start by reviewing some of the theory of online
security and then review the techniques used.
Principles of secure systems
Before we look at the principles of secure systems, it is worth reviewing the standard ter-
minology for the different parties involved in the transaction:
Purchasers. These are the consumers buying the goods.
Merchants. These are the retailers.
Certification authority (CA). This is a body that issues digital certificates that confirm
the identity of purchasers and merchants.
Banks. These are traditional banks.
Electronic token issuer. A virtual bank that issues digital currency.
The basic requirements for security systems from these different parties to the transac-
tion are as follows:
1 Authentication– are parties to the transaction who they claim to be (risk C above)?
2 Privacy and confidentiality– is the transaction data-protected? The consumer may want
to make an anonymous purchase. Are all non-essential traces of a transaction
removed from the public network and all intermediary records eliminated (risks B and
C above)?
TECHNOLOGICAL FACTORS