Impact of Society in I.C.T

Introduction

In this introduction I am going to discuss the impact of society in I.C.T which is e-mail, online shopping and banking, smart phones, computer, netbook, MP3 Players, podcasting, medicine and the advantages and disadvantages about each name.

E-Mail- First of all if you wanted to send an e-mail you would need a computer and an internet connection. You will have an e-mail address and password for example: yourname@hotmail.co.uk. The positive side on e-mails is that you can e-mail people from all over the world, and the negative side is that elderly people may not know how to use e-mails on computers. Everyone uses e-mails to communicate around the world. It is good to get a message around to others for when things are important. When signing up for Face book, Twitter etc, it will always ask you to summit your e-mail address which then you will get e-mailed when you get a message or a notification.

Online Shopping – Instead of going out driving in your car to the supermarket you can do it at home. For example: if you didn’t have time to do your shopping you can do it at your house and get it delivered directly to your house. The negative side is that elderly person wouldn’t know how to browse the web to shop and know how to enter your credit card details.  Hackers can also find out your details when on your computer which means that they are using your money to buy there own shopping.  

Online Banking - Instead of going anywhere to check your bank account, you can stay in the house and check it on the internet for free while some bank machines charge to use it.  Online Banking is useful as you can pay your bills from home instead of going anywhere.

Supermarkets – is full of IT as they use scanners to scan the food that customers buy and to tag the prices on products. Some supermarkets have tills that you can scan the barcode yourself. It’s all technology these days as you can see the image below that these are all the electronic software that supermarkets use for when you’re paying for your food. The manager would have a database as well to keep track on the products that is being delivered in and out, and you can add/remove products from the database. As well the supermarket would have a database of all of there workers on when they are working.

Smart Phones – Nearly everyone has a smart phone as they are important in life, as you can do mostly everything on them. Smartphone’s have cameras, internet, GPRS, 3G, Touch screens and screen at all different sizes. Years ago when phones were like bricks and had an Ariel all you could do really is phone people but these days phone can do mostly anything.

Computers – Computers are used by lots of businesses and schools as it is to help people for there future.  Years ago computers used to not even have half the things that they have now. Like you can connect USB’s and download/transfer information to your phone, USB Pen. Some computers even have Bluetooth with is transferring information wirelessly for example: Mobile Phones have Bluetooth.

Netbook Computers - A Netbook is a new type of laptop computer, defined by size, price, horsepower, and operating system. They are small, cheap, under-powered, and run either an old or unfamiliar operating system. Most students carry one of these around school as they are good for school and it’s portable as you can bring it anywhere you want.

Mp3 Music – Years ago there was no such things an mp3 players, iPods etc. These days there are all different sizes, shapes and prices. Some mp3 players have screens that you can choose what song you want and some don’t which you may have to shuffle through your songs. You can also watch videos as well which you can download from the internet and put it on your mp3 player and watch it where ever you want. IPods touch is the same as mp3 players only you can search the web, download apps, and play games.

Podcasting - Podcasting is a great way to allow children share there work and other stuff over the internet. Schools use the internet to promote what they do and to celebrate all the achievements and hard work that students do in school and podcasting is a great way of doing this. Podcasting is like a radio show, instead of being broadcast live you will be recorded and then distributed over the internet and you can listen to it whenever you want.  To listen to podcasts you go on the website of those who made the podcasts and you can subscribe to podcasts like iTunes.  These programs then will be downloaded the shows and then you can listen to your computer or mp3 player to subscribe to a podcast you will need the RSS feed which is the information that should be on the website.

Medicine – Hospitals use IT Technical’s to help treat people better. There is mostly even machine that is IT for example: x-rays, Virtual Surgery. Life support machines are very important in hospitals as there need them running for people that is in critical conditions. There are monitoring continuously done 24 hours a day and there are expensive to buy.  They use sensors to attract the patient heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate and temperature. When reading from sensors there are taken at regular intervals and used as input to a computer but if any of these readings on the monitor goes outside the levels and output signal sets off an alarm which will then alert the nursing staff.

This next section will discuss the potential threats.

Cyber Bullying - Cyber bullying online is very dangerous as most people are being bullied over Face book, Twitter, Mobiles phone. When people are getting bullied on these it can let to suicide which you hear a lot on the news. People also can create accounts on websites so there are anonymous and the person doesn’t know who they are while receiving bad messages.   It can also lead to not going into school, going outside etc as you are afraid to know what’s going to happen and also afraid to tell the parents or a teacher that they are getting bullied. On some websites you can block the bully so you can receive anything from them which then leaves you alone.

Hacking – people hack things these days for example: Bank accounts, e-mail accounts, Computers etc. When people get your bank account details they can hack into your account and take all your money and put it into there own account. Hacking into computers is another thing as you will have all your personal stuff on it saved. If you get your computer hacked your most likely to have all your documents stolen unless you have a password on your computer so they can’t access your accounts. Make sure that you have a firewall on your computer which stops people hijacking and viruses from attacking your computer.

Viruses – Viruses comes to computer when you download files which slow down your computer for example: Lime wire, Frost wire. These are music downloader’s which you can download again song you want for free instead of buying the single/album in shops. To stop viruses you must have your firewall on at all times which means that it can stop viruses from coming into your computer. As well as having a firewall you must install anti-virus software to protect your computer which you can update and scan your computer each day or you can have your computer update every hour automatically. 

Identity theft – There can be really smart people that can look through your computer. For prevent this happening to can remove your hard-drive from your computer, keep your personal details safe on a piece of paper and not saved as a document unless there can get your details. You should also make sure that trusted users of your computer are practicing identity theft prevention as well.  Children should protect themselves from identity theft by never using their real name in an email account and using their personal details on social networking sites. It is very important to protect the details of your computer to prevent identity theft and ensure their safety.

Phishing – Phishing is like when you check your e-mail one day and find a message from your bank. You've gotten an e-mail from them before, but this one seems suspicious, especially since it threatens to close your account if you ignore it and then receive more and more each day. This is an example of phishing, a method of online identity theft. In addition to stealing personal and financial data, phishers can infect computers with viruses and convince people to give them the details so they can take their money of them for nothing.

Stalkers – can harm people by not going anywhere as you are afraid of something happening to you. If people feel that they are being stalked they can ring the police or even talking to a random person on the internet that you do not know, don’t respond to them as most people that meet up on internet have been murdered. Stalkers can contact you by phone, e-mail, find you on account like Facebook, Twitter. Using a Camera/Video is called stalking as long as they don’t know that your videoing them. People have been put to jail for stalking.

Conclusion – In this conclusion I am writing about the advantages and disadvantages of using the internet and how technology is used these days from years ago when there did not have it.

Bibliography

 http://kidshealth.org/parent/positive/talk/cyberbullying.html : Last Accessed. 17/05/2012.