Relationship Between Ethics And The Sarbanes-Oxley Act

Midterm Exam – CIS500 - Baltzan Due Date: Sunday thru the link in Week 5. Please ensure your answers are worth 200 points. When you click on the exam you can cut and paste your answers straight into the test in Blackboard. Please note that this is an exam and I need to see far more than just a single sentence for an answer. The questions are worth different values and to receive full credit you need to fully detail your answer so I can understand your justifications and analysis. If you have any questions about the exam please contact me directly – I’m happy to help.
Paige!!
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1. 50 Points Choose one of the opening cases from chapter 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5. Answer the opening case questions
found at the end of section 1 and section 2 for the corresponding chapter. Be sure to list the chapter and the title of the case in your answer.
Chapter 4: Sarbanes-Oxley: Where Information Technology, Finance, and Ethics Meet 1.
Define the relationship between ethics and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act Ethics can be defined as the principles and standards that guide our behavior toward other people. The Sarbanes-Oxley act was put into place to prevent scandals in the workplace, especially in the Accounting/Finance department. The relationship between ethics and the Sarbanes-Oxley act is following your morals and values to prevent unethical acts from occurring with financial fraud. 2. Why is records management an area of concern for the entire organization and not just the IT department? The IT department controls the electronic documents. Internal and external controls must be put in place for the entire organization and the IT department when it comes to managing records. There must be some time of procedures put into place. 3. Identify two policies an organization can implement to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance. Segregation of duties within the systems development staff and making sure that the financial systems are meeting regulatory requirements for more accurate, detailed, and timely
filings. 4. What ethical dilemmas are being solved by implementing Sarbanes-Oxley? There are a lot of companies that face ethical dilemmas every day. When the Sarbanes-Oxley is being implemented, the dilemma of what needs to be stored and for how long is being solved. The SOX act specifically states that any organization should maintain all records and paperwork that was under an audit for a period of five years. 5. What is the biggest ethical roadblock for organizations attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance? The biggest roadblock for organizations that are attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance is ensuring that they are following all rules and regulations. Also, you have to make sure everyone in the organization is following the rules of the SOX act. Also making sure the system is properly updated to prevent any mishaps can become very costly. 6. What information security dilemmas are being solved by implementing Sarbanes-Oxley? The information security dilemmas that are being solved by implementing SOX is the fact that is there is falsifying, destruction , or alteration with the financial records, the person can be fined and/or be sentenced to prison up to 20 years. 7. How can Sarbanes-Oxley help protect a company’s information security? The fact that there should be a segregation of duties in the workplace. For example, the same person who process checks, shouldn’t sign off on the checks. Also, employees should only have access to the information they need. 8. What impact does implementing Sarbanes-Oxley have on information security in a small business? Implementing Sarbanes-Oxley on information security in a small business will be very challenging. Depending on how small the business is and how they manage their records can be very expensive when trying to implement Sarbanes Oxley. 9.
What is the biggest information security roadblock for organizations attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance? For any organization, attempting to achieve Sarbanes-Oxley compliance can become very challenging. Some employees may not adhere with the policies. Making sure the storing of all the records is accurate and updated can become costly as well.

2. 75 Points

You are working for Apple as the VP of operations. The founder – Steve Jobs – has asked you to rank the ilities for the Apple iPad from most important to least important. Be sure to provide your justification for each ilitie so Mr. Jobs can understand the logic behind your ranking. Please be sure to read chapter 5 for an overview of the ilities. The Apple iPad has multiple purposes. The Apple ipad can be used to browse the internet, play music, and watch videos, read books, check email, view photos, and a lot of other things. The Apple ipad is like a pocket size laptop. The five ilities are flexibility, scalability, reliability, availability, and performance. If I was the VP of operations for Apple and Steve Jobs asked me to tank the ilities for the Apple ipad from most important to least important, I would rank them in this order: 1)
Flexibility 2) Performance 3) Reliability 4) Scalability 5) Availability I chose flexibility as being the most important because there are people from different countries who would like to purchase the Ipad. If the Ipad was to only provide their services in the English language, this would prevent many none speaking or none reading English individuals from purchasing the product. It is very important that the phone is flexible for anyone to use in a country. Performance is the second most important because most people will buy a product based off of their speed and capabilities. Like for example, some people are going with cell phone companies that have the 4G network, because it is faster than 3G. Also since the Ipad have all of these different capabilities, people will find the use of the Ipad convenient when they are traveling. Reliability is the third most important because most people will want to ensure that the Ipad will be reliable wherever they go. An Ipad user also would want the product applications and system to not fail them whenever they need to use them. For example, some cell phone companies have downtime. Also, I have a BlackBerry Smartphone that has the BlackBerry Messenger which has had some downtime due to software issue. The BlackBerry Messenger is a feature on the Blackberry that lets individuals with BlackBerry communicate with one another. When this happens, the product becomes unreliable and users go searching for a more reliable product. Scalability is the fourth important because changes are occurring daily. As more people purchase the Ipad, there will be more demands for different applications. Also, as more people purchase the Ipad, Apple needs to able to handle the system with all of the input and output of data on the Ipad. There will be massive amount of information being processed through the network. Availability is the fifth important if Apple duplicates a system like the original one when system upgrades or maintenance occurs. If the Ipad meet all the above ilities that I mentioned first, an individual should not have a problem when the original system is available. If the Ipad is functioning at the same speed on the duplicated system, there shouldn’t be a problem. 3. 75 Points One of your good friends – Debbie - has just won the lottery!! Debbie has decided to invest the money in a startup business to provide music and movies online over the Internet and is wondering if you think this is a good investment of the winnings. Using the Porter Five Forces model, analyze this business opportunity and give Debbie your best advice. Be sure to explain how each force impacts her business.
Using the Porter Five Forces model, I would analyze the business opportunity as the following: The buyer power of a business to provide music and movies online over the Internet is currently high because many people can choose other companies online. Also, customers have the option of going out to the stores and buying music and movies. The supplier power of a business to provide music and movies online over the Internet is currently low, because Debbie has many choices of places and people to get the music and movies from to put on her website. The threat of substitute products or services of a business to provide music and movies online over the Internet is high, because many people can choose to buy their music and movies online elsewhere and can go into the store as well. Many people today do not buy original movies or compact discs. A lot of people buy “copied” movies and compact discs which is a whole lot cheaper than the original. The threat of new entrants of a business to provide music and movies online over the Internet would be high. Anyone can start the same business as Debbie as selling movies and music over the Internet. The competition will be very high. Rivalry amongst existing competitors of a business to provide music and movies online over the Internet would be high. There are many other companies who offer music and movies online over the Internet as well. Overall, I think this would be a bad investment for Debbie since the competition is high and there are also many other companies that sell movies and music online. If Debbie decided to keep her prices lower than her competitors, I don’t think she would make any money. She would probably break even. I would tell her to invest her money into something else.