AS ICT Unit 2 – Living in the Digital World

9.      ICT Systems and their components

10.   Data & information

11.   People & ICT Systems

12.   Transfer of Data in ICT Systems

13.   Safety & Security of ICT Systems

14.   Procedures for Backup & Recovery

15.   Uses if ICT Systems

16.   Factors & Consequences of ICT

2-15 - Uses and limitations of ICT

What has ICT given us?

• Fast, repetitive processing

One of the biggest reasons for using computers is because they can perform calculation very quickly.

• Vast storage capacity in a small space

The ability to store data electronically has considerably reduced the size of an area needed to store the data eg. Data sticks can now hold more data than a room of filing cabinets.

• Fast & flexible searching of data

 IT systems allow processing of large data very quickly, eg. Searching for a product on Amazon.

• Improved presentation of data

The use of multimedia technology has given us the ability to use a wide range multimedia resources to present data effectively. Such as the weather forecast information on the news

• Improved accessibility of information and services

With the ability to share resources online, individuals and organisations have much more access to information now.

What are the limitations of ICT

• Understanding speech
• High cost
• Reliant on electricity
• Quality of output (controlled by processing of data)
• Not model opinions
• Digital output compared to analogue output of sound (Quality)

2-14 Back Up & Recovery

A Backup is simply an extra copy of data.

If data become Corrupted or Stolen, it can be restored from the back up copy.

A Backup and Recovery stratergy is needed to plan how data is backed up and how it will be recovered

"Of all Companies that had a major loss of computerised records, 43% never re-open, 51% close within two years and only 6% will survive long-term."

Back up media, is the storage device used to store the back up
 - Examples would be:

• CDR or DVDR Disk
• Removable flash drive
• Removeable hard disk (Store large amounts of data, can be kept away from the main computer)
• RAID systems - instant backups in real time for large systems
• DAT Tape - Large capacity, used by business
• The Cloud - Remote backup services can be used for online back ups

Stratergy's for protecting  Data 

Back up Stratergy

•What files should be backed up?

•Who is responsible?

•When will the backups be done and which type?

•Where will the backups be stored?

•Which backup media will be used?

Recovery Stratergy

 •What files, OS & Applications need to be recovered?

 •Who is responsible?

 •When will the deadlines for recovery be?

 •Where are recovery offices and computer equipment?

 •How will we ensure continuity of service?

Types of Backup

Computer Misuse Act Homework

Level 1 - Unauthorised access to computer material

• Case: NHS Primary Care Trust Manage Accessed confidential female NHS patients records for personal use.
• Sentence: 6months imprisonment and suspension from work for two years.
• Summary: This person used sensitive information for his personal gain, therefore his sentence was fairly light for what he was using it for.

Level 2 - Unauthorised access to computer material with intent to commit a crime

• Case: Computer Operator at Henderson Financial Investment Services accused of hacking into the company's computer system with the intend to defraud her employer of 1 million pounds. 
• Sentence: 5 Years imprisonment & 1 million pound fine.
• Summary: This person attempted to steal large sums of money from her employer for her personal gain, her sentence is fairly moderate for what she did.

Level 3 - Unauthorised modification of computer material

• Case: Franchise manager aka warpigs virus writer used malware attached to spam to spy on victims using their webcams and steal their personall information.
• Sentence Eighteen month imprisonment.
• Summary: This person used his skills to his personall gain and took away people personal information, he only recieved eighteen months imprisonment for his actions.

Source of information: http://computerevidence.co.uk/Cases/CMA.htm

2-13 - Threats to ICT Systems

Five Threats to ICT Systems:

- Disgruntled Employees

- After an employee has been made redundant, once they find this out they could go back to their desk and make changes to the computer system, copy files or even delete them.

- An example would be deleting client details from a computer system after an employee has been fired.

- A way to guard against this would be to either remove the employee straight away from the company or to restrict the access to the system such as only being able to access file as read only. 

- Untrained Staff

- An untrained employee could make errors to the system or even go against company policy.

- An example could be an employee leaving a computer logged on when they are away from their desk, meaning anyone could access the information.

 - A way to prevent against this would be to give staff adequate training and make sure they are aware of the company’s policies. 

- Viruses

- Viruses don't always have to be a damaging to a computer system. However the normally are used to delete files or make significant changes to an IT system.

- An example of this would be a virus attached to an email that once opened starts deleting the files around it until the whole system has been infected.

- Ways to prevent this is to use virus checkers that are continually updated so all the known viruses can be prevented 

- Spyware

- This is where data stored on internal systems is sent to and external source

- For example someones key strokes are sent to an external source, which they then use to access data with passwords etc

- To prevent this would be to use spyware checkers, frequently change your passwords or turn your Internet on and off which would change your IP address.

- Hackers

- This is where a person accesses a computer system unauthorised and could try to commit a further offence such as stealing data.

- An example of this would be obtaining credit card details of a computer system and then buying goods with the details.

-  To prevent the possibilities of hacks the ICT system should have measures in place such as encryption of data, passwords that are changed regularly.

2-13 Computer Misuse Act

Computer Misuse Act (1990)

Three offences of the Computer Misuse Act:

- Unauthorised Access to computer material

   - Example: Bank Account access

   - Results in 6month imprisonment and/ or £5000 

- Unauthorised access with intent to commit further offences:

   - Examples: Credit card details stolen

             - Results in 5 years imprisonment and/ or unlimited fine

- Unauthorised modification of data

             - Examples: Changing grades on a school system, other examples could be viruses such                as Trojans

             - Results in 5 years imprisonment and/  or Unlimited fine

2-11 People and ICT Systems

1. Ict Systems: Design and Purpose
All system that are used must have designed to be used by the people that need it and for a particular purpose.

2. Things that need to be taken into account when designing a system would be

• The Experience of the user (are they competent with IT systems or not very computer literate)
• Physical characteristics (are they visually impared or can only see in ceratain colours)
• Task to be undetaken (is the system capable of meeting the demands of its users)

3. Users interact with computer systems in a variety of ways

1. The most common would be a GUI (Graphical User Interface) 
• This Kind of system users icons and pictures that are easily understandable, every level of user can use this interface as all the controll are common amongst most systems
• GUI's consist of Windows, Icons, Menus & Pointers
2.  The next would be Menu Driven Interface
• These types of interfaces can be good when the user only needs a limited choice of actions
• Mobile phone system generally used Menu Driven Interfaces but have now started to move towards using GUI's instead.
3. The third would be Command Line Interfaces
• These are commonly used by experienced users as they are much harder to understand adn use.
• When using this kind of interface the user must use text based commands which then result in an action by the computer, therefore the user must already know the commands for the system to work.

4. All user sometimes need help however trained they are, therfore for an IT system to be utilised fully all users must have regular training on new and old aspects of the system.

5. Benefits & limitations of user Interfaces

• GUI's tend to be more user friendly, as a result of the software being more intiative. This can be frustrating for experienced users, as they may have to go through three or four levels of menu to get what they require. These systems also take up a lot of disk space and memory.
• Command Line Interfaces are generally only used by exeriences users as they demand considerable knowledge. As they use little graphics they take up little resources and room.
• Menu Driven Interfaces These restrict the option a user can select, for example public access to a system, however getting information can be slow as your have to go through numerous levels of menus to get your desired action. These are often combined with GUI's which therfore take up a considerable amount of resources and disk space.

2-11 People and IT systems cont.

6. Working in ICT
There are many different jobs available to ICT professionals some of the main roles are:

• Software engineer
• Software developer
• Systems analyst
• Web-designer
• Network administrator

Each Job requires personal attributes  as well as job specific attributes, common ones are things such as:

• Leadership
• Team working
• Flexibility
• Creative
• Communication skills
• Problem Solving

Characteristics of an effective ICT team

1. Motivations, the team leader does not only ensure the task is completed but also ensures staff are motivated and working to meet deadlines set out by the managers.
2. The strengths and weaknesses of employees must be countered to minimise areas of risks
3. Good monitoring of the task to ensure it is complete on time
4. A well balanced team so all aspects of a system has had a good level of thought put into it
5. Communication is key to the success of the team.

2-10 Data & Information cont.

3. Processing Data

What is processing?

Processing is the work that a computer does to the data to convert it into information  This could include calculations,  sorts or even quires. It could also be used in sounds to alter the pitch or wave length.

What is information?

Data must be processed for it to turn into information, therefore computers are examples of data-processing machines. Information itself is data that has been processed into something meaningful. This could range from simple tasks like a calculation to producing detailed graphs of a companies sales & expenses. 

4. Quality Information

What makes information valuable?

Information can be brought and sold otherwise known as a commodity, because of this information has a potential value.

The value of information depends on some factors:

Accuracy

Information on a sales report must be accurate, otherwise any decision based on these figures will be inaccurate  This can hugely affect the running's of a business and therefore must be accurate. To ensure data is accurate it is vital that a method to thoroughly check data is applied along with regular updates to the information.

Up to date

Some information may on have value within a specific time scale, a good examples of this is the price of stock which can change several times within a minute, therefore buying and recommendations have to change very quickly, if the information is out of date then the information holds no value.

Complete

Information that is not complete loses value for instance.

Information produced on a house for insurance purposes must be complete in order for the house to be insured at the correct price.

Reliable sources

Once information is on the internet it is very hard to control, information put up could easily be inaccurate and therefore reduces its value. Because of this it is vital that information is gathered from reliable sources such as the BBC or other well known and trusted sources. 

Relevant

Information only holds value is it has a purpose, its value will also depend on the potential use it has. For examples sales data on employees must show the individual sales of a person so it can be used to calculate a bonus.

2-10 Data & Informatoin

1. Data & Information

ICT systems input data which is processed to convert it to information.

For example:

In some systems data is fed back into the system and modifying it till a desired output is reached. A Good It system will present each person with information that is useful to them in a form that makes it easy to use.

What is data?
Data represents raw facts and figures, for example: 2,3,4,5,6

Types of data.
Data can be in formats such as text and numbers, sound or images. Regardless of the data being imputed the computer processes this data into something called binary, like its very own language. This language consists of 0's & 1's, A single unit in binary is called a 'bit', the term used for a binary digit.

A computers memory is measured in bytes, 1 byte equates to 8 bits, An example of this would be the letter A this is represented in binary form as 01000001, and the letter B would be represented as 01000010.

2. Coding & Encoding

Some data has to be changed before it can be stored, therefore changing it from the original and shortening it into code. Coding is used to save space but it also speeds up data entry. A common example is substituting the word Male or Female for M or F.

Encoding is the computers was of converting data so it can be read by the machine. All computers run off binary, 1's & 0's, however this is very difficult for humans to understand. One way that encoding is used it the form of ASCII which can represent each character in a binary equivalent.

The table below shows a worked example of this:

Other examples of coding & encoding would be Bar codes & ISBN codes for books.

2-9 What is ICT

ICT is the use of technology for the input, processing storage, transfer and output of information

2 - Whats is an IT system?
 This is a procedure that involves, procession & output. A system does not always have to be a virutal system it can be a manual system as well.

3 - What is an ICT system?
This is where the output from the system goes directly to a human being or another ICT system.

4 - Components of ICT systems

The following are examples of compoments in an ICT system:
- People

• No ICT system can work without people being involved. One of the main stages is the analysis, desgin & the implementation of they system (Each linked to the clients requirements)
• After this there will need to be the occasiaonal maintinence

- Data

• This is the Raw facts and figures for examples numbers such as 40,50,34,72 are raw figures or A,C, G,E etc.
• Data is inputed using various hardware devices, the most common is a keyboard. Others could include a Bar-code Scanner, Digital camera or a Microphone.

- Procedures

• For an ICT system to work it requires  procedures. Procedures are a set a series of instructionsv which are conducted in a certain order or manner.
• Examples would be the Data proctection act, Computer misuse act & Copyright.
• Having procedures helps to protect data and can also help in communication such as everyone using the same hardware.

- Software

• Software is a program created to run hardware, meeting the users requirements. The choice of the software implemented by a company would depend on the role it will have for the company. Examples of this would be:
• Word processors
• Webpage designs
• Spreadsheets
• Desktop Publishing

- Hardware

• Hardware is the physical components of a Computer such as the Hardrive. The type of component chosen depends on the needs of the system, for example a supermarket system needs a VDU, visual display unit to show the weight and price of a product to the customer. Specialist output devices such as colour laser printers could be used, or normal peripherals such a keyboard which is an input device.
• There are 5 main hardware types:

• Input devices e.g. Keyboard, Scanner
• Processors e.g. CPU
• Output devices e.g. Printer, Monitor
• Ports & cables e.g. USB Univesal serial bus, Serial
• Storage Devices e.g. Hard drive, CD-RW, Memory sticks

- Information

• The final output of a system is called information. Information is data that has been processed such as a calculation,e.g. 2+2 = 4, 4 is the information  that is outputted by the system.