Research Proposal on "Impact of SPAM and Related Threats on Business Productivity and Security"

Research Proposal 23 pages (6188 words) Sources: 1+ Style: Harvard

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Business Productivity

The Affects of Span and Junk eMail on Business Productivity and Security

SPAM and junk email is a growing problem on the worldwide web. SPAM is a cheap alternative to direct mailings for the marketer. They can send out hundreds of thousands of emails with the expectation that a certain percentage will turn into sales. However, spam also presents a security risk, as it can allow the entrance of viruses and worms into the system. It can also serve as a means to steal personal information from the unsuspecting user. This study will examine the amount and types of email received by employees and managers at a major hotel. It will use numerical data, questionnaires and face-to-face interviews to accomplish its task. The results will be presented in the form of a report that outlines steps that can be taken to avoid the influx of spam on company computers.

The Affects of Span and Junk eMail on Business Productivity and Security

Introduction and Problem Outline

Everyday million of businesspersons across the world open up their email and find it filled with unsolicited, and mainly unwanted emails offering everything from shammy cloths to the latest in weight loss pills. Sorting through this junk to find the real emails from clients and business-related mail takes time and reduces productivity. In addition, since the Melissa virus caused devastating damage to systems around the world, email security is on everyone's mind. Everyone is wondering if that piece of email is legit, or if it will be the one to wreak havoc on their business system. Span and junk email pose a significant threat to business productivity and security. The proposed research study will address the topic of spam and junk email and its affect on productivity and security.

Background/Context

According to Winslow (2005), American Online claims to cull 75% of the incoming spam through filters. However, many small businesses do not have the capabilities to employ such large-scale filtration devices. For these companies, there is little that can be done, and spam can have a dramatic impact on their business (Winslow 2005). According to MX Logic, SPAM is down 9% (Winslow 2005), but they did not disclose exactly how they derived that number. With the average small business receiving close to 300 junk emails per day, this means a very small decrease in the number of emails actually received. This is hardly enough of a reduction to notice (Winslow 2005).

In a recent study, email was found to contribute to constitute a major portion of employee workload. On average, the typical user received 59 business related emails and send out around 27 (D'Antoni 2003). It is estimated that 28% of all incoming messages are junk mail (D'Antoni 2003). According to the study, the average worker spends 37 minutes every day dealing with junk email (D'Antoni 2003). This amount of time every day adds up to a whopping 12 hours or more of lost productivity every month. When one considers the hourly rate paid for those 12 hours, times the number of employees, this can add up to a major operating expense. This is one expense that does not result in increased revenues, but represents an unnecessary waster of time.

Worker reactions to spam were overwhelmingly negative. They found if annoying and offensive in some cases. However, when the subject line is interesting, the employee may read as many as two every day (D'Antoni 2003). The volume of spam is expected to increase. Companies will be forced to invest more in spam blocking technology or face increased operational costs due to the amount of time employees must spend dealing with spam.

The advent of spam and junk email led to technological advances that include blacklists, IP blockers, and mail filters. However, even with these tools, junk email continues to invade the email of employees (D'Antoni 2003). Junk email take a toll on businesses by stressing network bandwidth to the limits, reducing productivity, and leading to endless employee frustration (D'Antoni 2003). It was found that almost 66% of all companies use some type of email filtering to attempt to block spam (D'Antoni 2003). Those that do not will continue to face an increasing amount of spam and will have to suffer the consequences of lost productivity due to their choices

Spam creates a lose-lose situation for the business. Small businesses are less equipped to offset these costs than larger companies. Small businesses take a greater hit from the expenses involved in blocking it or in terms of lost productivity. They must either face increased lost productivity and the negative affects of the junk email assault, to they must spend increasing amounts of money to try to block at least some of it. For the recipient, there is little benefit to the spam itself. Much of it is not targeted marketing, or at least marketing that is well-thought out and planned. It is a numbers game in which companies increase their targets in hopes of capturing a small percentage of the sales.

We have already discussed the incredible number of spam emails that employees receive on a daily basis and the impact that this will have on the company. It is estimated that spam cost U.S. companies over $10 billion a year in 2003 (D'Antoni 2003). There is no guarantee that this technology will even help the problem. For every new piece of technology invented to reduce spam, companies that send spam invent new ways to get around it and "fool" the system into thinking that they are legitimate email.

In an attempt to rid inboxes of spam, some legitimate email gets misclassified and ends up unread in the junk email folder. This may be the one confirming the sale, or an important time-related message, but it does not get read and this can have devastating results. Nearly 46% of all users know that they have lost important email. Almost 21% are not sure and 33% indicated that they have not lost any email that they know of (D'Antoni 2003). However, it might be noted that those who answered "no" may not know how many important emails were lost.

A majority of email users indicated that they did not consider their spam filtering technology to be significant in reducing the number of junk emails in their inbox. Currently, there are measures being considered that will give the government some means to control spam, but many feel that these measures will be only minimally affective in reducing the number of junk emails that they receive (D'Antoni 2003).

Problem Presentation

This research will explore the real costs of spam for companies. Several studies have been conducted that explore the issue from the standpoint of time spent reading unsolicited junk email. However, spam has several costs that are not part of the costs considered in other studies. Aside from lost production in terms of time, this research will also explore the costs of spam in terms of the following:

Drain on network resources and unproductive bandwidth use

The potential to infect the system with viruses and worms

Attempts to use computer security for fraud, such as phishing

Analysis

The issue being addressed in this study is the impact of spam and junk email on business productivity and security. This is a problem that affects everyone, particularly small businesses that are not equipped to absorb the costs associated with spam. This target group for this evaluation will consist of small business managers, who will provide information regarding the affect of spam on their productivity and security issues.

The overall goal of the project is to provide a different perspective on the affects of spam on business performance. This research will take a different measurement approach than previous studies regarding the issue of spam. It is hoped that this research study will achieve the task of presenting a perspective of the problem of spam in relation to bandwidth usage and security issues. These two areas are a necessary element in understanding the impact of spam on business productivity. Data will be collected using face-to-face interviews and questionnaires.

Results of face-to-face interviews and questionnaires will help the researcher better to understand the issues related to spam and business productivity, and security issues. The end product will be a published set of security protocol in order to enhance productivity and reduce security threats to the company.

Planning

Spam represents a triple risk factor to business productivity. It reduces productivity by utilizing time bandwidth and other company resources. It introduces a security threat to the company as a whole through the introduction of viruses and worms. Spam also represents and individual threat in terms of personal information. Individual employees are in danger of having their personal information stolen via spam tactics such as spoof emails and such. Of these issues, personal and business level security will be the easiest of these risks to mitigate. If is difficult to control the amount of spam coming into the company and taking up bandwidth,… READ MORE

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