The Poem Fisherman by Kurt Brown Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

The Poem Fisherman by Kurt Brown - Essay Example From this examination obviously an entire life/lifetime would incorporate each action and this is the thing that the creator is investigating which he accepts to be spent ‘fishing in himself’ importance, investigating what is in him that is helpful. The angler isn't imagined angling in the stream or sea yet in’ himself’. This announcement in this manner proposes that ‘fishing’ is an allegory used to paint the demonstration of bringing out something significant from one’s self like abilities, aptitudes, ludicrous thoughts that could change the world or the cutting edge Einstein who could tackle all the issues in this PC age. The subsequent line finishes the idea of the creator that what the subject is angling in himself is ‘something grand’. What could be fantastic in an individual other than something that makes him catch everyone's eye? This announcement at that point fortifies the understanding that the man in the sonnet i s angling or investigating the potential outcomes of having some extraordinary abilities, gifts, even mentalities or encounters that could empower others or advantage them somehow or another as the man himself is profited for his own needs. That excellent thing the man is attempting to angle in himself is depicted in the following sentence as a ‘lost lunker, sufficiently large to break all records’. This line likewise affirms that the investigation on the sonnet is experiencing the correct way, that the stupendous thing being angled in an individual is something phenomenally enormous to be perceived as better than other men. ‘Rumors, legends, enormous guarantees of wonder’ could be accounts of accomplishments and supportive gestures of individuals around the globe, from various ages. This shows the character in the sonnet didn't actually observe achievers rather had quite recently found out about them with the goal that they are considered simply bits of go ssip, unwarranted and unproved. A few stories may even appear to be misrepresented and inconceivable with the goal that they are considered legends like the triumphs of Hercules and different saints of old. ‘Big guarantees of wonder’ could speak to consolations that express faith in an individual like the saying that goes ‘If others, why can’t I?’ Such persuades that for each individual, there is continually something exceptional that is sitting some place within him, holding on to be found and sustained. The ‘shadow of something tremendous obscuring the man’s life’ may be a representation of his questions and fears about what he has and what he can do. It is referenced that the man just felt this shadow and didn't see it. So often, men see with their emotions particularly with things that are as yet obscure and have not been attempted at this point and the greater part of these occasions, individuals are overpowered with the conc eivable outcomes of disappointment that is the reason they would prefer to go about with the ordinary exercises of men. At that point, the artist recommends that the shadow the man may have felt could be that of another fish’s, more prominent than his questions and fears. What could be frightful the man is the dread that he probably won't become as well known as someone else, as fruitful as his neighbor, as clever as his colleague, as gifted as the other kid or as creative as the customary

Causes of Childhood Obesity

Reasons for Childhood Obesity is an unnecessary measure of fat in the body. Stoutness happens when a person’s body gets a lot a bigger number of calories than it can consume without anyone else during the day. At the end of the day it implies that individuals eat liberal helpings of handled food; also, this food can comprise of a great deal of cholesterol, which is amazingly risky for the human body. Youth weight today has developed quickly and has gotten an upsetting scourge in numerous nations in the previous scarcely any decades. Studies show that since the mid 1970s, the level of the two youngsters and grown-ups who can be portrayed as overweight has doubled.According to a study by the Public Health Agency of Canada in 2007, self-announced rates among kids from age 12 to 17 of corpulence were 2. 9% for young ladies and 6. 8% for young men. It is fascinating that youngsters who have issues with weight are bound to become overweight grown-ups. In an examination by Lauren Mar cus and Amanda Baron (n. d. ) it was discovered that weight starts in adolescence for 30 persent corpulent grown-ups. Sientists give numerous explanations behind heftiness, however the fundamental three reasons for youth weight are hereditary qualities, absence of movement, and kids sustenance at school and at home.Muscular System: Muscle MetabolismIt is demonstrated by researchers that hereditary qualities assumes a significant job of people. Despite a reality that youth weight turned into an issue as of late, the researcher as of now have proof that youth heftiness is in any event halfway brought about by hereditary qualities. Studies demonstrate that some ethnic gatherings have more essentials to be corpulent or are all the more exposed to stoutness related disarranges; in addition, a high weight list could be related with certain qualities (Denis Daneman and Jill Hamilton, 2010). Many individuals accept that a kid has a 50 percent opportunity to be fat, on the off chance that th e person has one overweight parent.When a youngster has the two guardians who are hefty, there is a 80 percent or less possibility of being large. Most likely, qualities influence how a person’s body stores fat and how it is appropriates through the body. Moreover, hereditary qualities assumes a significant job in how soundly the body consumes got calories during the day and consumes calories during works out, and furthermore how viably the body produces vitality from food. Despite the fact that a youngster is hereditarily foreordained to corpulence, practices and an eating regimen both in families and in schools are the primary driver to pick up weight.Lack of movement is another reason for youth heftiness. It is demonstrated that every day investment in school physical training contributes beneficial outcome to physical turn of events, and manufactures a solid muscle framework for what's to come. On the off chance that a youngster isn't dynamic during the day, his body canà ¢â‚¬â„¢t consume the same number of calories as it needs to consume, and thus, from year to year a kid puts on more weight. Specialists Trembley and Willms in 2003 contended that â€Å"Automated work sparing gadgets and modest and pervasive access to calorie-thick food make a domain helpful for obesity.Excessive TV viewing and computer game use have been recognized as a boost for exorbitant eating and stationary behavior†. As indicated by the examination of Tremblay and Willmas a danger of being overweight is around 17 to 44 percent, and 10 †61 percent of being hefty is a result of staring at the TV and playing computer games (on the same page). It is essential for youngsters to have and take part in the dynamic life; in any case that calories got from a lousy nourishment before the TV couldn’t be consume appropriately by the body.That is the reason a child’s stationary way of life fills in as a door to the youth stoutness. Youth diet at home and at school is the most significant reason for youth stoutness. In any case, the individuals from the family share their qualities, yet in addition an eating routine propensities that contribute a great deal to youth stoutness in a family. Offspring of any age go through portion of their day in a school; along these lines, school food is a significant piece of children’s diet. It's anything but a major mystery that the food which kids eat each day at school is quick food.Furtheremore, everyone realizes inexpensive food is exceptionally handled, and unfortunate in the entirety of its structures, so what youngsters receieve is food made of off-the-rack parts, says Jamie Oliver (2010). A simillar circumstance at home, from the outset it is so helpful for guardians to make buys at general stores, purchase a half-completed items and invested less energy in cooking. By the by, that food as a rule doesn't contain any supplements; therefore the children’s body doesn’t get every sin gle valuable nutrient to grow appropriately, so the digestion can’t work at its full limit or consume calories as well.It has been contended by Michael Wieting (2007) that large youngsters drink significantly more sweet beverages and eat more fries, potato chips, meat substitutes with ketchup and mayonnaise, and eat white bread. These all add to the higher calories, sugar, and fat admission. At long last, unmistakably youth corpulence can be brought about by three principle reasons, for example, hereditary qualities, absence of movement, and sustenance at school and at home. Hereditary qualities could impact how the body adapts to calories, however in the event that a child’s guardians don’t take care over their progeny’s diet oth at school and at home, and furthermore don’t arrange child’s movement, the person may put on weight effectively in a next to no time. Not just guardians need to take care about their youngsters, likewise everyone o ught to recall that youth weight is turning into a risky scourge in numerous nations, and everybody’s task is to forestall stoutness, since kids are our future. Book reference Daneman, D. , and Hamilton, J. (2010). Causes and results of youth weight. Recovered from http://www. aboutkidshealth. an/En/News/Columns/PaediatriciansCorner/Pages/Causes-and-results of-adolescence heftiness. aspx Michael, W. (2008). Circumstances and logical results in Childhood Obesity: Solutions for a National Epidemic. The Journal of the American Osteopathic Association, 108(10)), 545-552. Recovered from http://www. jaoa. organization/content/108/10/545. full Marcus, L. , and Baron, A. (n. d. ). Youth Obesity: The Effects on Physical and Mental Health. Recovered from http://www. aboutourkids. organization/articles/childhood_obesity_effects_physical_mental_health Oliver, J. (2010).Jamie Oliver's TED Prize wish: Teach each youngster about food [Video File]. Recovered from http://www. ted. com/talks/j amie_oliver. html Pulic Health Agency of Canada. (2009). Corpulence in Canada †Snapshot. Recovered from http://www. phac-aspc. gc. ca/publicat/2009/oc/pdf/oc-eng. pdf Tremblay, M. S. , ; Willmas, J. D. (2003). Is the Canadian youth heftiness pestilence identified with physical inertia? (Vol. 27, pp. 1100-1105). Recovered from http://chaausa. nonprofitoffice. com/vertical/Sites/%7B0635C236-197E-47C6-8FBB-A80A08D4715B%7D/transfers/%7BB25D71A3-6FC3-4315-A19C-B8B476011EB2%7D. PDF

Technology and Privacy

Technology and Privacy Technology and Privacy Home›Technology Posts›Technology and Privacy Technology PostsAccording to Berg (2004), health information technology and the exchange of health information can help ameliorate both the efficiency and quality of health care, and can as well empower consumers to participate greatly regarding their own care. Both at the state and federal levels, the policy makers are making efforts to ensure that health care system has been computerized. However, the computerized technology in the field of health care poses a number of risks to the privacy of information regarding the status of health service consumers. There is a widespread misinterpretation and confusion regarding the aim of health privacy laws in the present time. Some of the privacy laws are attempting to address the privacy issues of the public and this requires a thoughtful, flexible, and comprehensive approach in order for issues to be resolved fully (Berg, 2004). According to Barnet Bedau (2011), the re are two opposite perspectives regarding the health information technology and privacy of the health consumer information. From some perspectives, privacy can be considered as an obstacle to attaining the improvements in health care due increased use of health information technology, while from other perspectives the enhanced security and privacy in the health information technology will strengthen consumer confidence and trust and spur increased rates of adopting the health information technology as the potential benefits will be realized.It has been found that Americans are cognizant of both the risks and the benefits of health information technology regarding the privacy of consumers’ information. A large number of citizens want computerized access to personal health information for themselves as well as for health care providers. This is because they strongly believe that the computerized access to personal health information can enhance better quality of health care (Smedle y Syme, 2000). Other individuals have significant issues regarding the privacy of personal medical records which is contrary to the allowed computerized access to personal health information. For these individuals, the privacy of personal health information can avoid the following: fraud or identity theft; using the personal medical information for marketing purposes; employers accessing personal health information; and the insurers getting access to contributors’ personal health information. Therefore, suitable protections to privacy must be integrated in the health information technology policies and systems. It is usually very difficult to lay down effective protections to privacy retroactively, as well as to restore the greatly undermined public trust. Protection of privacy has been found important because it avoids harm as well as ensures reliable and accurate information on which a lively health care depends (Yee, 2006).Lack of appropriate security and privacy protections w ithin the health care system, consumers will develop behaviors that they believe can enhance privacy so that their health information is not used in an inappropriate way (Yee, 2006). When individuals, become aware that the privacy of their health information will not be protected, they hold back information from the concerned health providers so that to avoid their medical data from being disclosed. Those individuals who are classified as ethnic and racial minorities report increased levels of the privacy issues regarding their medical records and have a higher likelihood of practicing the behaviors that can protect the privacy of the personal health information (Berg, 2004). The behaviors such as paying out-of-pocket for one’s own care, frequent switching of doctors, asking doctors to manipulate a diagnosis, or avoiding seeking medical care, are meant to protect the privacy of health information, which can in turn shield individuals from discrimination or stigmatization (Yee, 200 6). The consequences of such behaviors include: reduced quality of health care; impaired accuracy of the diagnosis and treatment of infections; escalation of treatment costs; undermining of the public health, quality, and research initiatives because of inaccurate medical records.It has been discussed that computerized technology in the field of health care poses a number of risks to the privacy of information regarding the status of health service consumers (Berg, 2004). There are two opposite perspectives regarding the health information technology and privacy of the health consumer information. From some perspectives, privacy can be considered as an obstacle to attaining the improvements in health care due increased use of health information technology, while from other perspectives the enhanced security and privacy in the health information technology will strengthen consumer confidence and trust and spur increased rates of adopting the health information technology as the poten tial benefits will be realized (Smedley Syme, 2000). Some individuals strongly believe that the computerized access to personal health information can enhance better quality of health care. Other individuals have significant issues regarding the privacy of personal medical records which is contrary to the allowed computerized access to personal health information. The negative impacts of computerized health information on privacy outweigh its positive impacts, and therefore privacy of personal health information need to be protected.

Rwand The Rwandan Genocide - 1296 Words

The Rwandan genocide was the killing of 800,000 people in just 100 days. The Rwandan genocide took place in 1994. During this time Rwanda was a small country with a mostly agricultural economy. Although it is small it had one of the largest populations. In 1994 Rwanda was made up of three different ethnic groups. The Hutu made of 85% of the Rwandan population. The Tutsi’s made of 14% of the population and was the minority. The Twa was a small Pygmy group that made up 1% of the population (unitedhumanrights.org). The Rwandan genocide was a horrific and terrorizing event that changed the country forever because 800,000 people were murdered, people were ordered to murder others just because of their ethnic group, and other countries didn†¦show more content†¦Shortly after that, Belgium gave Rwanda their independence (history.com) The Rwandan genocide didn’t just start right after that. There was a spark that marked the beginning of the Rwandan genocide. On Apri l 6, 1994, a plan that had President Habyarimana and the president of Burundi Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down. It has still not been concluded who shot the plane down. The Hutu’s blamed the Rwandan Patriotic Force (RPF) and the Tutsi’s blamed the Hutu’s. Soon after this, the Presidential Guard, the Rwandan armed forces, and Hutu militia groups started to slaughter all Tutsi’s. They set up roadblocks all across Rwanda so that nobody could flee or try to escape (history.com). Before any political leaders could take any action, the Hutu’s killed them. Tutsi women were raped and taken to be used as sex slaves (humanrightscouncil). The slaughter and killing from Kigali soon spread all across Rwanda. In just three months 800,000 people were killed. 3/4 Tutsi’s were murdered during the Rwandan genocide. People were killed in churches, homes, schools, and many other place (â€Å"A Good Man in Hell†). During this time, government radios and officials were telling civilians to kill. They were told to kill anyone who was Tutsi or anyone who supported the Tutsi’s. The RPF kept fighting back and by early July the RPF had claimed and got control over most of Rwanda. Then over two million Hutu’s fled the

Why Was Africa Called the Dark Continent

The most common answer to the question, â€Å"Why was Africa called the Dark Continent?† is that Europe did not know much about Africa until the 19th century. But that answer is misleading and disingenuous. Europeans had known quite a lot about Africa for at least 2,000 years, but because of powerful imperial impulses, European leaders began purposefully ignoring earlier sources of information. At the same time, the campaign against slavery and for missionary work in Africa actually intensified Europeans’ racial ideas about African people in the 1800s. They called Africa the Dark Continent, because of the mysteries and the savagery they expected to find in the interior. Exploration: Creating Blank Spaces It is true that up until the 19th century, Europeans had little direct knowledge of Africa beyond the coast, but their maps were already filled with details about the continent. African kingdoms had been trading with Middle Eastern and Asian states for over two millennia. Initially, Europeans drew on the maps and reports created by earlier traders and explorers like the famed Moroccan traveler Ibn Battuta, who traveled across the Sahara and along the North and East coasts of Africa in the 1300s. During the Enlightenment, however, Europeans developed new standards and tools for mapping, and since they weren’t sure precisely where the lakes, mountains, and cities of Africa were, they began erasing them from popular maps. Many scholarly maps still had more details, but due to the new standards, the European explorers—Burton, Livingstone, Speke, and Stanley—who went to Africa were credited with (newly) discovering the mountains, rivers, and kingdoms to which African people guided them. The maps these explorers created did add to what was known, but they also helped create the myth of the Dark Continent. The phrase itself was actually popularized by the British explorer Henry M. Stanley, who with an eye to boosting sales titled one of his accounts Through the Dark Continent, and another, In Darkest Africa. However, Stanley himself recalled that before he left on his mission, he had read over 130 books on Africa.   Imperialism and Duality Imperialism was global in the hearts of western businessmen in the 19th century, but there  were subtle differences between the imperialist hunger for Africa compared to other parts of the world. Most empire building begins with the recognition of trading and commercial benefits that could be accrued. In Africas case, the continent as a whole was being annexed to fulfill three purposes: the spirit of adventure, the desire to support good work of civilizing the natives, and the hope of stamping out the slave trade. Writers such as H. Ryder Haggard, Joseph Conrad, and Rudyard Kipling fed into the romantic depiction of a place that required saving by strong men of adventure.   An explicit duality was set up for these adventurers: dark versus light and Africa versus West. The African climate was said to invite mental prostration and physical disability; the forests were seen as implacable and filled with beasts; and crocodiles lay in wait, floating in sinister silence in the great rivers. Danger, disease, and death were part of the uncharted reality and the exotic fantasy created in the minds of armchair explorers. The idea of a hostile Nature and a disease-ridden environment as tinged with evil was perpetrated by fictional accounts by Joseph Conrad and W. Somerset Maugham. Abolitionists and Missionaries By the late 1700s, British abolitionists were campaigning hard against slavery in England. They published pamphlets described the horrid brutality and inhumanity of plantation slavery. One of the most famous images showed a black man in chains asking â€Å"Am I not a man and a brother?† Once the British Empire abolished slavery in 1833, however, abolitionists turned their efforts against slavery within Africa. In the colonies, the British were also frustrated that former slaves didn’t want to keep working on plantations for very low wages. Soon the British were portraying African men not as brothers, but as lazy idlers or evil slave traders. At the same time, missionaries began traveling to Africa to bring the word of God. They expected to have their work cut out for them, but when decades later they still had few converts in many areas, they began saying that African people’s hearts were unreachable, locked in darkness. These people were different from westerners, said the missionaries, closed off from the saving light of Christianity. The Heart of Darkness Africa was seen by the explorers as an erotically and psychologically powerful place of darkness, one that could only be cured by a direct application of Christianity and, of course, capitalism. Geographer Lucy Jarosz describes this stated and unstated belief clearly: Africa was seen as a primeval, bestial, reptilian, or female entity to be tamed, enlightened, guided, opened, and pierced by white European males through western science, Christianity, civilization, commerce, and colonialism.   By the 1870s and 1880s, European traders, officials, and adventurers were going to Africa to seek their fame and fortune, and recent developments in weaponry gave these men significant power in Africa. When they abused that power—especially in the Congo—Europeans blamed the Dark Continent, rather than themselves. Africa, they said, was what supposedly brought out the savagery in man. The Myth Today Over the years, people have given lots of reasons why Africa was called the Dark Continent. Many people think it is a racist phrase but cant say why, and the common belief that the phrase just referred to Europes lack of knowledge about Africa makes it seem out-dated, but otherwise benign. Race does lie at the heart of this myth, but it is not about skin color. The myth of the Dark Continent referred to the savagery that Europeans said was endemic to Africa, and even the idea that its lands were unknown came from erasing centuries of pre-colonial history, contact, and travel across Africa. Sources Brantlinger, Patrick. Victorians and Africans: The Genealogy of the Myth of the Dark Continent. Critical Inquiry 12.1 (1985): 166–203. Print.Jarosz, Lucy. Constructing the Dark Continent: Metaphor as Geographic Representation of Africa. Geografiska Annaler: Series B, Human Geography 74.2 (1992): 105–15. Print.Shaw, Marion. Tennysons Dark Continent. Victorian Poetry 32.2 (1994): 157–69. Print.Shepard, Alicia.  Should NPR have apologized for Dark Continent?  NPR Ombudsman.  February 27, 2008.Stanley, Henry M. Through the Dark Continent, or The Sources of the Nile Around the Great Lakes of Equatorial Africa and Down the Livingstone River to the Atlantic Ocean London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle Rivington., 1889.Stott, Rebecca. The Dark Continent: Africa as Female Body in Haggards Adventure Fiction. Feminist Review 32.1 (1989): 69–89. Print.

Psy 270 Appendix G Free Essays

University of Phoenix Material Appendix G The DSM-IV The DSM-IV is an important tool for clinicians. It provides a standard for diagnoses to be standardized across psychology; however, the DSM-IV is not as precise for diagnosing personality disorders as some psychologists would like. Give an example of each of the following problems identified in your readings and explain how these problems could negatively affect a diagnosis. We will write a custom essay sample on Psy 270 Appendix G or any similar topic only for you Order Now 1. Some criteria used for reaching a diagnosis cannot be observed directly. When it comes to diagnosing patients it can be different to gather all the criteria needed during observations. Sitting face to face with a patient and getting their view on the subject is not the same thing as experiencing or watching the problem unfold first hand as something you observe outside of a study room. Because we are not able to see the problem as it unfolds first hand we are not able to receive all the accurate information, and when a client recounts the events he or she could always leave something out that would be important in the diagnoses. These cases can lead to misdiagnosing and possible worsening of the problem. An example would be how difficult it is to diagnose autism and how many children have been misdiagnoses for this very reason. 2. Personality disorders can be similar to each other. Personality disorders can be very similar to each other with their symptoms making it hard to properly diagnose personality disorders in a onetime face to face discussion. Misdiagnoses are even more likely to occur is the information is not coming from the patient first hand and is instead coming from a parent and another third party 3. People with different personalities can be given the same diagnosis People with different personalities can be given the same diagnosis if it is a general diagnoses. This occurs because individuals with differing personalities can have the same symptoms but handle them differently because they are different people. For example a narcissist could easily be diagnoses with OCD. 4. Do you think that personality disorders are true mental illnesses? Why or why not? I do think that personality disorders are true mental illnesses. Trying to talk to or be with around someone who has narcissist personality can you see for yourself that you aren’t just dealing with someone who is selfish and rude it is much more than that. And furthermore, if it wasn’t psychologist would have been able to prove that by now. How to cite Psy 270 Appendix G, Essay examples

Legal Regulatory And Political Practices of USA and UK Australia

Question: Discuss about the Legal Regulatory And Political Practices of USA and UK Australia. Answer: Pestel- Australia: Political In order to adjust with the changes made by government relating to tax and other regulations as necessitated by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), some political policies and laws are required. Every state of the country have their specific laws which makes it necessary to recognize the respective differences while operating in different states. Similar to the case of USA and UK, Australia also has a variety of legal, regulatory and political practices. The interference of the federal government have been witnessed a number of times in order to reduce the entry barriers and giving the consumers with more power in comparison with the two major supermarkets. When 20 cents discounts were being provided to the customers by Cole Express which was subsequently misleading the consumers, there was an intervention of the government. The changes introduced by government such as the $5 note resulted in significant costs for Coles due to the non- recognition of monetary value by self- checkout machines. The ban on plastic bag enforced by the South Australian Government on all Coles Departmental Stores and Supermarkets necessitated the purchase of plastic bags by the customers in case they do not carry their own environmental friendly shopping bags. This ban on plastic shopping bags was not imposed by other states in Australia. The changed government budget led to the reduction in sales due to its impact on the students. The sales number also gets impacted as a result of changes in the visa conditions for international students. The regulations of ACCC guide the Officeworks which lead to the promotion of fair trading practices and the legislations of competitive behavior. The industrial sector is monitored by the government as there are a number of rule and regulations that must be upheld by the organizations for the purpose of ensuring the safety and wellbeing of every employee. There is stability in the political government which assists in providing a desirable market for the businesses. Diverse rules and regulations are encountered by the commercial property profiles in every state. An agreement has been signed by Wespine with WA Government for the purpose of ensuring that the purchases of saw laws are only created by state owned or private pine plantations over a period of 40 year. Economic There is low unemployment rate in Australia which can further reduced with the help of increasing store openings in Australia. The interest rates and inflation rate will contribute towards the buying power of the customers. A vital role is played by trade and investment in the economy which has strong relationships with various countries for the purpose of ensuring the effective maintenance of partnerships and trade agreements. The exchange rates and taxes are considered to be important due to the import of some products Bunnings. There is no volatility in the corporate tax rate which remains steady at 30% after 2006 (The Global Economy, 2017). The goods and services in Australia suffer from fluctuating tax rates from the past 10 years which have brought uncertainty to businesses. There is a stable trend in the taxes on international trade in Australia with a maximum of 2.52% and a minimum of 1.81% in the last year (The Global Economy, 2017). A strategy has been put in place by the departmental stores for the purpose of ensuring fair wages and long-term employment opportunities. Approximately 1300 people have been employed by Kmart Automatic and Services that contributes towards the economy in reducing the unemployment rate. Increase in units sold and transactions take place with the increase in number of stores opened. The products of departmental stores are sourced internationally and locally which assist in creating overseas jobs. There is a constant change in Australian economy due to the fluctuations in energy cost, foreign investment, interest rates, employment rates and economic growth. The prices of goods and services are also affected by the economic conditions. Officeworks is capable of providing low costs to the customers by way of sourcing these goods internationally. The entrance of Amazon within the retail business has become a challenge for various retail businesses. An Initial Public Offering has been already held by Officeworks for discussing the future of Officeworks with stakeholders. Multiple businesses are operated by WesCEF in Australia which in turn provides employment to nearly 1200 people. Skill development and job opportunities are facilitated by Aboriginal Engagement and Employment Plan. Community contributions equivalent to $310,000 have been provided for ensuring the support to councils and local programs. $30,000 was donated to WA Farmers Esperance Fire Appeal for contributing to bushfire damages to businesses. Merchandise is supplied by Workwear group to large overseas organizations which have the capability of positively influencing the Australian economy. Specialized clothing to emergency and defense service are also provided by Workwear Group. Financial services for other businesses are the center of focus of Gresham Advisory Partners Limited which assists the Australian economy. Long-term relationships have been maintained by Gresham with advisors and clients present in different international and domestic locations. Overseas relations are based in US and Europe. The commitment of the organization to constructing sawmill is ensured by the agreement of Wespine with WA Government that have the capability of increasing sales and positively impacting economies of scale. Socio- Cultural The growth in Australian population has led to the increased demand for household goods. (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2017). Increased demand for fat free foods and gluten-free foods has led to the requirement of adjustment in shelving within aisle for catering the shifting demand within business units that are responsible for selling food products. Bunning made sustainability commitments by introducing campaigns and offering financial assistance. This includes garden workshops, project assistance and sausage sizzles and makeovers. Priority is given to training and development programs for ensuring strong culture within organization and safe working environment for employees. Departmental stores such as Room to Read and Salaam Baalak are heavily invested by various community organizations overseas which focus on assisting children and families at the times of need. Officeworks participates in school activities and charities that focus on the significance of environment and recyclable cartridges. Importance is given to the health and safety of individuals which is reflected from the annual report by the reduced number of injuries in workplace. Leadership roles and team diversity are equally offered to women in the organizations along with providing indigenous employment programs for increasing opportunities. Safety of individuals is the focus of WesCEF within the workplace through their Safe Person, Safe Process, Safe Place programs, which concentrates on business responsibilities, leadership and support and involvement in environmental activities. Contributions are made by WesCEF to sponsors, community organizations, sporting clubs and local colleagues. WesCEF has sponsored STEM (science technology, engineering, mathematics) project which is a big community investment. Councils and local programs are supported by the community contributions worth $310,000. $30,000 was donated to WA Farmers Esperance Fire Appeal for contributing to bushfire damages to businesses. Merchandise is supplied by Workwear group to large overseas organizations which have the capability of positively influencing the Australian economy. Specialized clothing to emergency and defense service are also provided by Workwear Group. Success of the business is due to its employees for which their safety is important. The improved safety standards have led to reduced injuries in the annual reports of Wesrfarmers. Active involvement of Gresham Advisory Partners Limited along with its employees has been witnessed in foundations, charities and community activities. Disaster relief is addressed by Gresham nationally and overseas. Technology The combination of digital and retail formats is allowed by business units into one which allows the organization to target larger market which in turn will also provide the customers with online shopping platform. Regular servicing, updating and maintaining is required by equipment that are utilized which includes self- checkout machines, computer units and testing systems. Performance of the business is impacted by the instant communication between consumers and business through social media. Online shopping experience is provided to the customers by Coles which has changed the way in which goods are provided and delivered to the customers. Various electronic products and devices are offered by Bunnings which is important to the existing revenue. The Automatic Technology (ATA) performs its work with DD Technologies for producing a system with the help of which remote access is provided to the garbage gates and doors. Sales can be improved through technological advances in products and equipment. The relationship of Bunning will get influenced with suppliers, employees and customers by technological innovation as it will improve transactions and communications. IMB POWER 7 Technology has been implemented by Bunnings in 2011 for sustaining the expansion and growth in other countries. It will facilitate the communication of Bunning in an effective manner with UK, Ireland and New Zealand at any time. The benefits of technology to business have been identified with Bunning and therefore it has committed to invest in IT infrastructure for ensuring its competitive advantage. RFID card systems have been introduced for all stores which assist in eradicating long queues. Website has been launched by Officeworks which allows the customers to purchase the products online resulting in high inventory turnover. A dedicated IT team has been installed by Officeworks that ensured functional security across platforms. Constant maintenance and updates are required for construction building by Wespines machinery. For ensuring smooth production, regular maintenance of machinery and equipment is required for completing mining tasks. Environment Certain practices have been listed by Australian Government within retail industry such as process for waste management, use of plastic bags, sustainability reporting and recycling (department of industry and innovation). Environmental impacts are managed by Bunnings within its business operations. Energy usage levels are reduced by Coles at specific petrol stations, supermarkets and stores for contributing to sustainable environment. This includes changed refrigeration type for reducing energy, solar panels usage and use of LED lights. The reduction in transportation trucks assist in contributing cleaner air. There is very limited impact of the products of Departmental Stores on the environment. Better Together program focuses on environment, people and working conditions. Global environmental danger is contributed by internationally sourced products and air pollution is contributed by transportation of goods. Commitments relating to reduction in carbon dioxide emissions and improvement in energy efficiency are essential for Officeworks. Recyclable cartridges collection works alongside with Planet Ark and department of industry and innovation. BringITback program works alongside recycling collection of computer equipment. carbon intensity of products and waste recycled percentage is decreased by the recycling programs. Programs lead to the identification of waste reduction and recycling importance by the team leaders in the organization. Energy monitoring systems installation and implementation of LED lights in stores has contributed towards the environment. Officeworks make the use of paper products that are 100 percent recyclable. Chemical production is not sustainable for environment. Wellbeing and health of the individuals are affected by all chemicals as they are toxic and harmful. For screening and decking of products, the manufacturing of wood-plastic composite material is emphasized as they are environmental friendly. Wood- plastic is better substitute of timber. Pine is created by Wespine which is environmental friendly while producing timber for constructing building. Sustainable business is operated by BWP Trust. Itsmanagement and ownership of commercial properties have low impact on the environment such as emissions, waste, energy and materials, etc. Legal Success of an organization depends on the wellbeing and health of the individuals. The implementation of Health and Safety Standards is necessary across all stores along with the entitlement of the employees to the policies of Fairwork Australia. The change in laws relating to Tobacco and Alcohol provides that it can only be used by individuals over 18 years of age. All the stores across the world has to adjust due to the change in laws of displaying tobacco. The laws and regulations applicable to the wholesale and retail trade industry must be complied by Bunnings in electrical products, building supplies, hardware and floor coverings. Codes and safety standards are compulsory to be followed by Bunnings as regulated under The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). The products imported by Wesfarmers are subject to licensing and permits under the Australian Business Licence and Information Service (ABLIS). Australian national Fairwork and Health and Safety laws are required to be complied by Wesfarmers for all employees. Retail and wholesale trade industry also suffers from the application of taxation rules such as GST for export and imports. Fire and Building Safety has been committed by Kmart in Bangladesh for enhancing the working conditions and empowering its workers. For items such as glues, knives and scissors, age restrictions have been implemented. Ethical sourcing audit program and group- wide ethical sourcing policy have been implemented into organizations for decreasing the risk of practices that are unethical. Regular inspections are conducted by ACCC for ensuring the implementation of Fair Trading in all businesses in Australia. Hazardous and dangerous nature of working in industrial industry necessitates the requirement of insurance for employees and organization. Extra precautions are required for the health of employees when they are surrounded by chemicals all the time. Business principles are developed by BWP Trust into their business based the United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment. Business principles are classified into governance, environmental and social issues that are inserted in the policies, procedures and processes. Rules and regulations are required to be formed for leasing agreements for commercial properties according to the states in Australia. Portfolio management of Wesfarmer is focused on the diversification of its portfolio across various markets and industries along with making the identification of growth opportunities and business operations that maintains sustainability. Wesfarmers operates in various sections such as household consumables and retailing groceries. Liquor is also retailed through the chain of liquorland, 1st choice stores and Vintage Cellars. It also has convenience stores with petrol outlets through the joint venture of petrol retailer Shell and Coles Express. Coles also has section for financial services with insurance services and credit cards and operates in various hotels under the brand of Spirit Hotels (Wesfarmers Limited 2016). It is difficult to focus on all the strategies at a single time by the organization, therefore, for the purpose of achieving success, the primary target of the organization should be to provide sustained commitment to one of the strategies (Porter, 1980). According to Porters Five Forces Analysis, the strategy adopted by Coles is a combination of differentiation and cost leadership strategy. The cost leadership strategy of Coles ensures the value offered to the customers at lowest possible costs (Wesfarmers Limited 2016). Its prices have been lowered by the Down Down marketing campaign in comparison with the key brands due to the adoption of superior supply chain and activities that provide economies of scale (IBISWorld 2016). The differentiation strategy is brought by Coles through its brand image which has been developed over decades with the introduction of various products in the market. However, same products are being induced by the competitors that offer fresh food products with high quality as a result of which it is not able to gain competitive advantage. Therefore, both cost leadership and differentiation strategy has been integrated by Coles in order to provide different products at lowest possible prices. In other words, superior qual ity is offered by Coles to its customers through innovative ways at lowest costs. Merger, Acquisition And Downsize: Wesfarmers Limited- Future Strategic Merger, Acquisition or Downsize: Definitions and Recommendations Downsizing can be defined as the reduction in the operating costs of an organization by way of reducing the number of employees (Nelissen Van Selm 2008). It occurs due the reason of deficient performance or poor economic conditions. It also occurs due to high expenditures and costs suffered by the company which necessitates reducing the number of employees so that costs can be lowered and profitability can be maintained. It can also be a result of merger between two companies which requires reduction in the operating costs by reducing its employees (Edwards Patton 2012). The terms mergers and acquisitions are considered as synonyms but have different meanings. Merger takes place when two companies are combined into one entity or when one company buys another company (Bris Cabolis 2008). Acquisition always involves a purchase. The takeover of a company is also called acquisition when the existence of the acquired company comes to an end and a new owner is established (Tikhile 2014). Merger takes place between two companies which are of same size and agrees to proceed as a single newly formed company instead of operating with different owners. The manner of purchase also constitutes a difference between two legal figures. It means that hostile purchases are called acquisition and negotiations made in peaceful environment are called mergers (Betton, Eckbo Thorburn 2008). Various recommendations have been made for future downsizes acquisition or strategic merger of Wesfarmers Limited business units. The company should analyze the reasons and improvements that can be obtained from downsizing, expanding or selling. Firstly, synergy should be looked for the company which will improve the performance and reduce the costs by way of combining business activities (Kumar Bansal 2008). Secondly, merger and acquisition will provide benefit of diversification to Wesfarmers which in turn will reduce the impact of industry performance on the profitability of Wesfarmers (Arikan Stulz 2016). Thirdly, the opportunity of expanding the market share is provided by merger by purchasing the business unit of the competitor for a price. The products and customers are kept by the acquired business unit (Hoberg Philips 2010). Some business units of Wesfarmers such as Home Improvement through which great profits were obtained on 30June 2016 under Bunnings brand and Chemical s Energy and Fertilizers could obtain benefits of acquiring and merging with the distributors or suppliers. Costs can be eliminated with the help of buying them as the margins can be saved that were added to the costs by the supplier, known as vertical merger (Li, Liu Liu 2011). Some information should be taken into consideration at the time of taking the decision related to merger and acquisition. As an investor in a company, Wesfarmers should consider the benefits arising from the purchase. First step for consideration is valuation. The target company will be valued as high as possible from the sellers end and at the lowest price possible from the buyers end. Therefore, knowledge regarding various methods should be obtained in order to make the proper assessment of the target company which includes replacement cost, comparative ratio and discounted cash (Gomes et al. 2013). Second step includes proceeding with an offer. After decision regarding merger and acquisition is taken by top managers, the starting of the deal should take place with tender offer. At this stage, it is recommended that Wesfarmers should function with investment bankers and financial advisors. The deal ends when an offer is made by both parties that satisfy both parties after negotiation of the demanded amount (Collan Kinnunen 2011). Scrutiny is also faced by some companies from regulatory bodies and this should be understood by the company. This happens in cases when big size of the companies enables them to create monopoly or a threat in the industry (Collan Kinnunen 2011). After the deal is finalized by the companies, payment is made through cash, stock or both. Advice regarding which business units should be expanded by expansion and which SBU should be downsized or sold. Coles and Industrial safety Business units: downsize The definition of downsizing provides that the reason behind the downsizing of a company include its deficient economic performance and the need for reduction of costs and maintenance of profitability. The costs and expenditure of Coles can be effectively reduced by downsizing strategy and it will affect profit of Coles. In 2016, highest revenue was earned by Coles for Wesfarmers Limited with $39,242,000 but still it was not as profitable like the other business nits such as Kmart, Home Improvement or Chemicals Energy and Fertilizers.it is surprising that the company that have made the investment of $22,122,000 on its assets can earn a profit of $1,860,000, while the profits obtained by Home Improvement is $1,214,000 with revenue of $11,571,000 and assets of $6,620,000 which imply that 10.5% profits with respect to revenue as compared to Coles that account for 4.7%. For reducing the gap between profits and revenue, Coles is advised to downsize itself. The costs and expenditures of Co les are required to be reduced that are before profit and after revenue. For increase profit and maximizing efficiency, it is advised to restructure the company. The downsizing of Coles could increase its profitability. The costs and expenditure of Industrial and Safety business units are required to be reduced due to the fact that its profit as % of revenue is low (3.4%) in comparison to other business units. Resources and Target Business units: Sell The ultimate objective of a business is to generate profit. When there is no profitability in the business and there are no hopes for making profit in the future, selling or closing the business is a best option. Two segments are there in the business units of Wesfarmers: Mineral and Metal Wholesaling in Australia and Black Coal Mining in Australia. The business unit resources suffered a loss of $310,000 on 30 June 2016 and revenue of $1,008,000 which was only 1.5% of the total revenue. Therefore, a major loss is represented by the business unit which was -30.8% as the profit as % of revenue. Moreover, there is a growth in the forecast of this business unit between 2017- 2022 equal to -7.4% which imply that resources as SBU are not going to make profits in future (IBISWorld 2016 pp. 15). Wesfarmers does not occupy the major portion of the market. Its major competitors occupy 38.9% of the market share. This and 420 other companies in the industry face a negative forecast growth rate w hich requires the development of strong strategy. Another business unit, Target, is also not making profits. In 2016, this business unit was restructured with Kmart for creating a new operational division known as Departmental stores. This was used as a strategy to incentive the performance of Target under the same strategy of Kmart which made an outstanding performance. On 30 June 2016, the revenue of Target amounted to $3,456,000 which was equivalent to 5.2% of Total Revenue. In fiscal year 2016, this business unit was ended with $195,000 loss which made profit as % of revenue to be -5.6%. Attempts are being made by Wesfarmers for making it sustainable and profitable. However, all the resources should be taken into consideration by the organization for the purpose of keeping Target alive instead of concentrating on other business units. This will assist in boosting profitability and growth of the business units. However, the results of Targets are not improving. The half year resu lts of Wesfarmers for the year 2017 provides the deficient performance of Target as its revenue was $1,623 million in December 2016 while it was $1975 million in December 2015. This implies there was negative revenue of 17.7% in 2016. These reasons suggest that the business units of Wesfarmers should be closed or sold off. However, Kmart and Home Improvement have the capability of improving its profitability with the help of acquisitions and future transactions. It is advised that Wesfarmers should sell Resources and Target which will help them in getting cash requested for acquiring business units from other organizations. Kmart and Bunnings Business units: Acquisition Home Improvement (Bunnings) and Kmart are the business units of Wesfarmers Limited that performed outstandingly well on 30 June 2016. The revenue of Home Improvement was $11,571,000 which accounted for 17.5% of the total revenue. The revenue of Kmart was 7.8% of the total revenue. Both the operational divisions concluded with profit with respect to revenue of 10.5% and 9.1%. For the year 2016, these two business units were found to be the second and third most profitable businesses. it is therefore recommended that Wesfarmers should increase its focus on these business units for the purpose of booting them. Any effort made in these businesses has the capability of leading it towards growth. Both Kmart and Bunnings are profitable but still it is recommended for Wesfarmers that the business of Bunnings should be boosted as it appears to be the most sustainable business unit. The historical growth of Bunnings was 6.8% for the operating segment Hardware and Building Supplies Retailing in Australia and the forecast growth rate amounted to 2.8%. Such rates were among the highest rates among all the operating segments. After taking into consideration the profit and revenue obtained by Bunnings through its operations along with its outstanding performance of Hardware and Building Supplies Retailing in Australia and the forecasts made relating to growth rates, diversification appears to be the most successful way of growing the business of Bunnings. This can be done with the help of acquitting other business unit from a company or corporation itself. By considering the benefit of the fact that the most important operating segment is building of suppliers, investment should be made by Bunnings in acquitting a company belonging to construction industry. The company could be in building or housing urban projects which in turn will allow the expansion and diversification of its operations to the industry of which it is a main supplier. It is the Australias third largest ind ustry and it also drives economic activity in a significant manner (Li Liu 2012). Bunnings can become the supplier of a new company by way of acquiring the company belonging to this sector. This will assist in subsequently reducing the costs of materials and will facilitate the profitability of the new company and creating a sustainable supply chain which will bring advantages to both the companies. Therefore, Bunnings should take steps for acquiring construction companies like AV Jenningsm ADCO Constructions, Burbank, BCI Australia and Cockram, etc.

Hawaii, With An Area Of 28,313 Sq. Km (10,932 Sq. Mi.), Is The Essays

Hawaii, with an area of 28,313 sq. km (10,932 sq. mi.), is the 43rd largest state in the U.S.; 6.9% of the land is owned by the federal government. It consists mainly of the Hawaiian Islands, eight main islands and 124 islets, reefs, and shoals. The major islands in order of size are Hawaii, Maui, Oahu, Kauai, Molokai, Lanai, Nihau, and Kahoolawe. Population growth has increased by 80,000 persons over the past five years. Demographics show a large number of Hispanic origin: Asian Hispanics are the most populated with white Hispanic and Asian non-Hispanic following. Hawaii's economy has been long dominated by plantation agriculture and military spending. As agriculture has declined in importance, the economy has diversified to encompass a large tourist business and a growing manufacturing industry. Hawaii's economy has changed drastically since statehood. In 1958, defense, sugar, and pineapple were the primary economic activities, accounting for 40% of Gross State Product (GSP). In contrast, visitor-related expenditures stood at just over 4% of Hawaii's GSP prior to statehood. Today the positions are reversed; sugar and pineapple constitute about 1% of GSP, defense accounts for just under 11%, while visitor-related spending comes close to 24% of Hawaii's GSP. The movement toward a service- and trade-based economy becomes even more apparent when considering the distribution of Hawaii's jobs across sectors. The share of the economy's jobs accounted for by manufacturing and agriculture have declined steadily since 1959 and each currently makes up less than 4% of total jobs in the economy. At the same time, the shares of jobs in wholesale and retail trade and in services have risen, standing at about 23% and 28%, respectively. Since 1991, Hawaii's economy has suffered from rising rates of unemployment. This stands in marked contrast to the period 1980 to 1993, when the state enjoyed very low unemployment rates relative to the nation as a whole. But by 1994 the recession had raised Hawaii's unemployment rate to the national average (6.1%) for the first time in 15 years. In 1995, the state's unemployment rate improved slightly in the first eleven months of the year to 5.4 percent, a 0.6 percentage point decline from the first eleven months of 1994. Despite the lower unemployment rate, the total number of wage and salary jobs declined by 0.6 percent during the first eleven months of 1995. This was due in part to a fall in part-time jobs which are often held by persons who also have primary jobs elsewhere in the economy. The number of construction jobs declined by more than 7 percent in the same period. Other industries--namely, manufacturing, agriculture, transportation, communications/utilities, and finance, insurance, and real estateexperienced declines in the number of jobs as well. Jobs in retail trade and services, however, increased 2.2 percent and 0.5 percent, respectively, reflecting an increase in visitor spending since 1994. Following a dismal first quarter due to the Kobe earthquake, there was steady growth in the tourism sector in 1995 with increases in the number of visitor arrivals and hotel room rates. The number of visitor arrivals to the State increased 3.2 percent during the first eleven months of 1995. The increase in the value of the Japanese yen vis-a-vis the U.S. dollar during this period contributed to a rise in eastbound visitors in the second and third quarter of 1995 by 11.8 percent and 15.4 percent, respectively. However, in the first eleven months of 1995, the number of westbound visitors remained flat. This year is the 11th year in a row that the U.S. has experienced reduced spending on national defense. The continued reduction is due to the decline in superpower tensions and the political disintegration of the Soviet and East European-block during this decade which have prompted the Congress and Administration to initiate significant cuts in the level of defense expenditures in recent years. However, because of the strategic location of Hawaii in the Pacific this changing military posture has not significantly affected Hawaii's $3.7 billion Federal defense sector. The construction industry continued its decline in the first eleven months of 1995. This loss was mainly due to decreasing demand exacerbated by higher interest rates during the first half of 1995, following a 12.4 percent drop in 1994. Another reason is that construction costs rose by 15 percent from 1992 to 1995, which is much higher than the consumer inflation rate of 8 percent during the same period. Agriculture jobs, including self-employed, showed a 6.6 percent decline in the first eleven months of 1995 from the same period in 1994. In the earlier part of the year, the agricultural work force fell to its lowest level in 21 years. Agriculture

Likable and Dependable

Likable and Dependable Are these two tools part of your branding? Arent sure? Then theyre probably not. But why are these two traits so important when youre selling your words and not a public performance? Jane Friedman and Porter Anderson recently established a newsletter on the publishing industry titled THE HOT SHEET (http://hotsheetpub.com/). I was a Beta reader as they worked out the kinks. Its intensely smart, as would be expected from these two industry brains, but in a recent issue they addressed this issue of what readers expect in an author: The scientific finding from Nielsen: Authors, in general, are among the publics fave people in the entertainment world. Only TV and film actors score more highly with fans, which means that authors are rolling in ahead of sports figures and musical artists. Whats more, fans of authors like their authors more than fans of other types of people like their icons - even athletes are not as highly thought of Most of the authors I know fall into one of two categories: 1) They write a lot and promote when they have a new release or an upcoming event; or 2) They promote one book a lot and are slow in putting out new releases. That makes both inconsistent and less reliable, and according to that Nielsen report cited in THE HOT SHEET, makes those writers give the appearance of being less successful, influential, and dependable. So what does that mean for you . . . the burgeoning, struggling writer? It means you write and market each and every day. You appear to always be on the move, always producing, always available to the reader. Its hard, but doing otherwise these days when the competition is steep and the books cheap, will leave you in a lot of writers dust where readers wont be able to find you.

Integration is not easy to achieve but when it is achieved, the 4 Es Essay

Integration is not easy to achieve but when it is achieved, the 4 Es and 4 Cs of IMC create the synergistic benefits of integration - Essay Example However, with lots of choices including the media’s bombardment of potential customers with the right messages, this is having no effect to the potential (Figen, 2006). An effective Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) which will unify multi-channels, synchronize communication and group together the three aspects of communications; advertisement, public relations and marketing towards relating intimately with the customers, is the only solution viable for firms to reap the benefits of marketing. This is made possible by the use of both online and offline marketing channel with complementary media to ensure consistency in the delivery of message. Sometimes even with an effective Integrated Marketing Communications program, firms need have a competitive advantage over other similar firms in the industry and should therefore include the 4E’s and the 4C’s on Integrated Marketing communications to create the synergistic benefits of integration. Broderick and Pickton (2005 28) rightfully state that â€Å"Integration is not easy to achieve but when it is achieved, the 4 E’s and 4 C’s of IMC create the synergistic benefits of integration† in this respect. The following suggestions will discuss the integration of the 4C’s and the 4E’s within IMC. The 4C’s of communication propose that integrated marketing communications should have consistency, coherence, continuity and be complementary while the 4E’s propose integrated marketing communications should be economical, efficient, enhancing and effective (Figen 34). Being economical involves using minimum resources, time and strategies necessary for effective consideration and most importantly, being cautious with money to avoid overspending. To ensure profitability for any firm, Integrated Marketing Communication should be economical. Costs incurred in running integrated marketing communication should not exceed or level with the expected returns. To

Plagiarism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words - 11

Plagiarism - Essay Example Plagiarism may either be a deliberate action or unintentional. According to Plagiarism.org, actions that qualify as plagiarism include submitting other peoples views pretending they are your own views, duplicating other peoples ideas or research without acknowledging their contributions, improper citations which include citing false references, and duplicating the organization of words in a sentences without acknowledging the origin. It is worth noting that plagiarism can be averted through acknowledging the fact that the ideas, views, or sentence organization originated from a particular source (Plagiarism.org). There are a number of ways through which plagiarism can be averted. The secret to writing a plagiarism free essay or research paper is writing everything in owns words. Subsequently, other peoples views ought to be properly referenced of cited. In case one is not conversant with the various citation styles, it would be of significance to seek the help of the teacher or lecturer (Plagiarism.org). Plagiarism.org also asserts that initial preparations prior to the commencement of writing an essay or research paper is important in avoiding plagiarism. Coming up with a succinct sketch out or summary of ideas helps set a benchmark in regard to ideas to be retrieved from other peoples works and own ideas. It is of significance to assert that a writer ought to clearly separate his or her own ideas from those retrieved from other peoples works. However, it is also important to reword other peoples ideas so that a paper can appear original. Cited sources should be from well acclaimed researchers or sources in text citations should include the author of the book of source, year of publication, and page numbers depending on the citation style used. In definition, a citation is referred to as a method or technique used to notify those

Techniques of Spoofing Attacks

Techniques of Spoofing Attacks Spoofing is sending fake address of a transmission to gain entry which is illegal into a secure system. It is creates fake responses or signals in order to keep the session alive and prevent timeouts. It captures, alters, re-transmits a communication stream that can mislead the recipient. Hackers use it to refer especially to the TCP/IP packets of addresses in order to disguise a trusted machine. The term spoofing has spread all over the world. The term spoofing refers to stealing the passwords and personal information of a particular person from the internet. The word spoof came into existence by the British comedian Arthur Roberts in 1852.In the 19th century, Arthur Roberts invented the game spoof and thus the name. This game had the use of tricks and non-sense. The first recorded reference to this game in 1884 refers to its revival. Very soon the word spoof took on the general sense of nonsense and trickery. The word spoof was first recorded in 1889.[4] TYPES: Types of Spoofing covered are as follows: 1. E-Mail Spoofing 2. Caller ID Spoofing 3. SMS Spoofing 4. Website Spoofing 5. DLL Spoofing 6. IP Spoofing 1.1.1 Definitions: 1) E-Mail Spoofing: Basically email spoofing is of the type in which the sender address and other parts of the email are altered so that it appears as if it is sent from a different source 2) Caller id Spoofing: Caller id is the way of making fake calls to other people wherein the number of the sender appears as if he/she is calling from another number. 3) SMS Spoofing: SMS Spoofing allows us to change the name or number of the text messages appear to come from. 4) Website Spoofing: Website Spoofing is a method of misleading the people or perhaps the readers that the website has been made by some other organization or by some other known person. 5) DLL Spoofing: DLL code runs in the context of its host program, it inherits the full capabilities of the programs user with spoofing. 6) IP Spoofing: IP spoofing is the way in which the sender gets unauthorized access to a computer or a network by making it appear that a certain message has come from a trusted machine by spoofing the IP address of that machine. SECTION 2 EMAIL SPOOFING 2.1 INTRODUCTION: This is considered to be one of the most used techniques of spammers and hackers. They spoof their return e-mail addresses. That makes it look as if the mail has come from some other person. This is a form of identity theft, as the person who sends the email acts to be someone else in order to distract the recipient to do something. 2.2 OBJECTIVE: The objective of spoofed mail is to hide the real identity of the sender. This can be done because the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) does not require authentication. A sender can use a fictitious return address or a valid address that belongs to someone else. The mails that are spoofed can be very annoying, irritating and at times dangerous. Having your own address spoofed can be even worse. If the sender or probably the hacker uses our address as the return address, then our inbox may fill with receivers complaints as well as they might report us in the spammers as well. This type of spoofing can be very dangerous. 2.3 MOTIVES: These might be the possible motives of an attacker: 1. This is spam and the person who sends doesnt want to be subjected to anti-spam laws 2. The e-mail constitutes threatening or harassing or some other violation of laws. 3. The e-mail contains a virus or Trojan and the sender believes you are more likely to open it if it appears to be from someone you know 4. The e-mail requests information that you might be willing to give to the person the sender is pretending to be, as part of a social engineering. 2.4 PHISHING: Phishing is associated with Email spoofing. Phishing is the practice of attempting to obtain users credit card or online banking information, often incorporates e-mail spoofing. For example, a phisher may send e-mail that looks as if it comes from the banks or credit cards administrative department, asking the user to log onto a Web page and enter passwords, account numbers, and other personal information. Thereby obtaining the users confidential information.[2] 2.5 WORKING: This is the most easily detected form, in e-mail spoofing it simply sets the display name or from field of outgoing messages to show a name or address other than the actual one from which the message is sent. Most POP e-mail clients allow you to change the text displayed in this field to whatever you want. For example, when you set up a mail account in Outlook Express, you are asked to enter a display name, which can be anything you want, as shown in Figure 2.1. Fig 2.1:ÂÂ  Setting the display name in your e-mail client The name that we set will be displayed in the recipients mail program as the person from whom the mail was sent. We can type anything you like in the field on the following page that asks for your e-mail address. These fields are separate from the field where you enter your account name assigned to you by your ISP. Figure 2.2 shows what the recipient sees in the From field of an e-mail client such as Outlook. Fig.2.2ÂÂ  The recipient sees whatever information you entered When this simplistic method is used, you can tell where the mail originated (for example that it didÂÂ  notÂÂ  come from thewhitehouse.com) by checking the actual mail headers. Many e-mail clients dont show these by default. In Outlook, open the message and then clickÂÂ  View | OptionsÂÂ  to see the headers, as shown in Figure 2.3. Fig 2.3:ÂÂ  Viewing the e-mail headers In this example, you can see that the message actually originated from a computer named XDREAM and was sent from the mail.augustmail.com SMTP server. 2.6 PREVENTIVE MEASURES: Although legislation may help to deter some spoofing, most agree that it is a technological problem that requires a technological solution. One way to control spoofing is to use a mechanism that will authenticate or verify the origins of each e-mail message. The Sender Policy Framework (SPF) is an emerging standard by which the owners of domains identify their outgoing mail servers in DNS, and then SMTP servers can check the addresses in the mail headers against that information to determine whether a message contains a spoofed address. The downside is that mail system administrators have to take specific action to publish SPF records for their domains. Users need to implement Simple Authentication and Security Layer (SASL) SMTP for sending mail. Once this is accomplished, administrators can set their domains so that unauthenticated mail sent from them will fail, and the domains name cant be forged. SECTION 3 CALLER ID SPOOFING 3.1. INTRODUCTION: This type of spoofing is all about changing the Caller ID to show any desired unidentifiable number on the persons caller id who receives the call [1]. Caller id spoofing is a way of calling someone without them knowing who actually the person is, by hiding the phone number from their caller id. It is also known as the practice of causing the telephone network to display a number on the recipientsÂÂ  Caller id displayÂÂ  which is not that of the actual originating station. Just asÂÂ  e-mail spoofingÂÂ  can make it appear that a message came from any e-mail address the sender chooses, Caller ID spoofing can make a call appear to have come from any phone number the caller wishes. Because of the high trust people tend to have in the Caller ID system; spoofing can call the systems value into question hence creating problems for various parties associated with it. NAMES OF COMPANIES THAT PROVIDE THE CALLER ID SPOOFING FEATURE: SpoofCard Phone Gangster StealthCard TeleSpoof 3.2 WAY TO MAKE TEXT DISPLAY ON CALLER ID DISPLAY: With the help of the Spoof Card, Stealth Card, TeleSpoof and many more we can make the text show up on the caller id display instead of number. We have to choose some text from the huge list of funny caller id text phrases and that text will be displayed as our phone number. Some texts are shown below in the image. Fig 3.1 Text that can be shown in the caller-id display 3.3 USES: Caller-id spoofing can be used in the following places: Doctor needing to disguise home number so that he doesnt get unwanted calls on his home number Worried spouse wanting to find the truth Calling back an unknown number to find out the unknown identity without revealing original number Hiding your location 3.4 METHOD: Caller ID can be spoofed in many different ways and with different well advanced technologies. The most popular ways of spoofing Caller ID are through the use ofÂÂ  VoIPÂÂ  orÂÂ  PRIÂÂ  lines. Other method is that of coping theÂÂ  Bell 202ÂÂ  FSKÂÂ  signal. This method, calledÂÂ  orange boxing, uses software that generates the audio signal which is then coupled to the telephone line during the call. The object is to deceive the called party into thinking that there is an incomingÂÂ  call waitingÂÂ  call from the spoofed number, when in fact there is no new incoming call. This technique often also involves an accomplice who may provide a secondary voice to complete the illusion of a call-waiting call. Because the orange box cannot truly spoof incoming caller ID prior to answer and relies to a certain extent on the guile of the caller, it is considered as much aÂÂ  social engineeringÂÂ  technique as a technical hack. 3.5 MOTIVES: Sometimes, caller-id spoofing may be justified. There are necessary reasons for modifying the caller ID sent with a call. These can be the possible places where caller-ids are spoofed: Calls that come from a large organization or company, particularly those companies that have many branches, sending the main number is a good option. Consider this example. A hospital might have the primary number 777-2000, and around 250 lines functioning inside the main building, and another 200 at the clinic that is located around 50 miles away. I t may happen that most of the numbers will be in the form of 777-200XX, but it might also happen that many of them have an unrelated and unidentifiable numbers. Therefore if we have all calls come from 777-2000, it lets the call recipients identify that the incoming call is a hospital call. Most of the calling-card companies display Caller IDs of the calling-card user to the call recipients. Many Business owners and dealers use Caller ID spoofing to display their business number on the Caller ID display when they are calling from a place outside the office premises (for example, on a mobile phone). Skype users have an option of assigning a Caller ID number for preventing their outgoing calls from being screened by the called party (Skype Caller ID in the USA is 000123456). Google application Google VoiceÂÂ  displays its users Google Voice number when the users make calls from the service using their landline numbers or mobile phones. Gizmo5ÂÂ  sends the users Gizmo5 SIP number as outbound Caller ID on all calls. Because Gizmo5 IDs are in the format 747NXXXXXX, it is possible to confuse calls made from Gizmo5 with calls made fromÂÂ  area code 747. Fig 3.2. Software for Caller id Spoofing SECTION 4 SMS SPOOFING 4.1 INTRODUCTION: SMS Spoofing allows us to change the name or number of the text messages a recipient would appear to receive. It replaces the number from which the text message is received with alphanumeric text. This type of spoofing has both legitimate and illegitimate applications. The legitimate manner would be setting your name or company name or the product name for or from which the text message is sent. So thereby the text message received will display the name or the company name or the product name and the purpose in the case for e.g. a product (publicising it) would thus be served. The illegitimate way would be when a person or a company would use the name of some other person or name or a product with the intentions of causing losses to the concerned. 4.2 MOTIVES: SMS Spoofing takes place when the user from sending end changes the address information so as to conceal the original address from reaching the user at the receiver end. It is done mostly to impersonate a user who has roamed onto a foreign network, needs to be submitting messages to the home network. Generally these messages are addressed to destinations that are beyond the range of home network with the home SMSC (short messaging service centre) being hijacked hence causing messages to be sent to other network 4.3. IMPACTS: Following are the impacts of this activity: 1) Due to the hijacking of the home SMSC, The home network can bring in termination charges caused by the delivery of these messages to interconnect partners. This is termed as quantifiable revenue leakage. 2) These messages can be of concern to the partners involved. 3) It is possible that it comes under the notice of the customer that he is spammed and the message sent maybe of personal, financial or political importance to the concerned person. Therefore, there is a risk that the interconnect partners might threaten to stop the home network from functioning until and unless a suitable remedy is found and properly implemented. Hence, the consequence of this would be that the Home subscribers will be unable to send messages into these networks. 4) While fraudsters generally use spoofed-identities to send messages, there is a risk that these identities may match those of real home subscribers. This implies, that genuine subscribers may be billed for roaming messages they did not send and if this situation does arise, the integrity of the home operators billing will be under scrutiny, with potentially huge impact on the brand itself. This is a major churn risk. 4.4 USES: A person sends a SMS message from an online computer network for lower more competitive pricing, and for the ease of data entry from a full size console. They must spoof their own number in order to properly identify themselves. A sender does not have a mobile phone, and they need to send an SMS from a number that they have provided the receiver in advance as a means to activate an account. 4.5 THREATS: An SMS Spoofing attack is often first detected by an increase in the number of SMS errors encountered during a bill-run. These errors are caused by the spoofed subscriber identities. Operators can respond by blocking different source addresses in their Gateway-MSCs, but fraudsters can change addresses easily to by-pass these measures. If fraudsters move to using source addresses at a major interconnect partner, it may become unfeasible to block these addresses, due to the potential impact on normal interconnect services. SMS Spoofing is a serious threat to mobile operators on several fronts: 1. Mischarging subscribers. 2. Being charged interconnects fees by the hubs. 3. Blocking legitimate traffic in an effort to stop the spoofing. 4. Assigning highly trained and scarce resources to tackle the problem 4.6 EXAMPLES: Messages sent from Google are sent with the Sender ID Google. Skype sends messages from its users with the mobile number they registered with. Note that when a user attempts to reply to the SMS, the local system may or may not allow the replying message to be sent through to the spoofed origin. A user who does not have a mobile phone attempts to sign up for a Foxy tag account, which requires an SMS from a phone number that the user registers with. A dynamically assigned number from an anonymous SMS service will not work because the user is not given the dynamic number in advance to register with. Fig 4.1 this picture above shows the process of sms spoofing. SECTION 5 WEB SPOOFING 5.1 INTRODUCTION: Website spoofing is a type of spoofing which creates a website or web pages that are basically run with the intention to mislead users into believing that the particular website is created by a different group or a different person. Another form of website spoofing is creating false or fake websites that generally have the same appearance and layout as the original website and tricking people into sharing their personal or confidential information with the false Website. The fake websites can have a similar URL as well. Another technique associated with false URL is the use of Cloaked URL.This technique uses methods of domain redirection or URL forwarding which convincingly hides the address of the actual website. Website spoofing is often associated with Phishing. It can also be carried out with the intention of criticizing or making fun of the original website or the website developer or fraud as well.[3] 5.2 CONCEPT: So we can say that web spoofing basically enables an attacker/spoofer to create a shadow copy of the entire World Wide Web. Accesses to this fake Web are monitored through the attackers system, which helps the attacker to keep a watch on all of the victims web-activities. These activities include passwords and personal information (bank account numbers). It can also happen that in the victims name, the attacker sends certain information to the web servers or send any kind of information to the victim in the name of any Web server. Basically, the spoofer controls everything The victim does on the Web. 5.3 CONSEQUENCES: As the spoofer or the attacker has complete control(observing capability as well as modifying capability) over any data that is transmitting from the victim to the web servers and also all the data transactions from the servers to the victim , the attacker can misuse this in many ways. Some of the misusing ways are surveillance and tampering. 5.3.1 Surveillance: The attacker can conveniently spy on the traffic, registering which pages and sites the victim visits or surfs as well as the content of those pages. For example, when the victim fills out a particular form on a particular site, the entered details are transmitted to a server. The attacker can record all these details, along with the response sent back by the server. And as we know, most of the on-line commerce is done using forms; this information can also give the attacker -the account passwords and other valuable data of the victim. This is highly dangerous. Surveillance can be carried out by the spoofer even if the victim has a so called secure connection to the web-server. So basically, even if the victims browser shows the secure-connection icon (usually an image of a lock or a key) . It can be possible that the attacker is still successful in his Surveillance. 5.3.2 Tampering: Surveillance is basically just observing and registering confidential data of the victim. The spoofer can also MODIFY any of the data that may be travelling in either direction between the victim and the servers. This is called Tampering. If there are any forms submitted by the victim to the web servers, the attacker can bring about changes in the data entered. For example, if a person is purchasing a certain product on-line, the spoofer can change the product details, product number, shipping address etc. The attacker can also change the data returned by a Web server, for example by inserting misleadingoffensive material to trick the victim or to cause problems between the victim and the server. Misleadingoffensive material to trick the victim or to cause problems between the victim and the server. 5.3.3 Using the Web: It is not really difficult to spoof the entire World Wide Web, even though it might seem to be difficult. The attacker does not really have to store all the contents of the Web. The Web in its entirety is available on-line; so the spoofers server just has to fetch the required page or pages from the real Web whenever it needs to provide a copy of that page on the false Web. 5.4 Working of the attack: For this attack to work, the main duty of the attacker is to sit between the victim and the rest of the Web. This arrangement of sitting between the victim and the web is called a man in the middle attack. 5.5 Method: One of the most frequently used methods for web spoofing is URL Rewriting. 5.5.1 Url Rewriting Once the attacker fetches the real document, the attacker rewrites all of the URLs in the document into the same special form by same spoofing technique. Then the attackers server provides the rewritten page to the victims browser. This is how URL rewriting is used for spoofing. 5.6 Protection: Web spoofing is one of the most dangerous and undetectable security attacks that can be carried out in the web-world today. But of course, there are certain preventive measures that can be taken: 5.6.1 Short-term protection: These are the steps to follow for short term protection: a) Disable JavaScript in your browser so the spoofer wont be able to hide the evidence of the attack; b) Your browsers location line should always be visible; c) Observe URLs displayed on your browsers location line, and make sure that the URLs always point to the server you think youre connected to. 5.6.2 Long-term protection: There is no fully satisfactory long-term solution to this problem. But few things that can be done: a) Changing browsers can help, so they always display the location line. But the users have to know how to recognise the correct URLs. b) Using improved Secured-connection indicators. Fig 5.1.The picture above gives an idea of how web spoofing is done SECTION 6 DLL SPOOFING Dynamic Link Libraries or DLL are software object modules, or libraries, linked into a program while it is running DLLs are a feature that allows programs to share common codes so as to help developers to make programs easily and efficiently.DLLs are extensively used in newer versions of Windows. Fig 6.1.This picture above is hardware id DLL 6.1 INTRODUCTION: DLL code runs in the context of its host program, it inherits the full capabilities of the programs user with spoofing. The DLL spoof causes a legitimate program to load a DLL with a Trojan horse instead of legitimate DLL. DLL spoofing can occur even if the legitimate DLL is beyond the attackers reach. Since when a program loads DLLs it searches through a sequence of directories looking for the required DLL. Spoofing occurs when the attacker succeeds in inserting the infected DLL-file in one of those directory in such a way that program finds it before it finds the legitimate DLL of the same name. Hence even if the file is write-protected or the attacker doesnt have access to the directory which contains the legitimate DLL then also he can attack the program. Whenever a user runs a program there occurs a linking algorithm which is used to find the file that holds the DLL. Usually it is the one with DLL suffix. Linking algorithm searches through three different categories: 1. Programs directory: It is the directory which holds programs file. 2. System directory: Contains a series of entries. As we have discussed earlier to spoof the user only needs to insert an infected or malicious DLL file into the working directory. If the infected DLL file has the same name as the legitimate DLL then the algorithm will link the fake DLL file to the otherwise trusted program. The infected DLL can then create a new process. It runs in the full capabilities of the user who runs the, it perform the task and request the original DLL file as asked by the user so as not to arouse suspicion. With the help of fake DLL the attacker can now do whatever task he want which is under the capabilities of the fake DLL. Among the three above mentioned directories, the program directory and the system directory are most vulnerable as the location is predefined. But in the case of working directory this task is hard to perform as the directory is set by the program only and hence its directory is unknown to the user. Fig 6.2 dependency walker 6.2. WORKING OF ATTACK: This is where the social engineering skills come into play. The attacker tries to convince the user to open a simple file. This simple file can be a image too and can be located at any remote place like http://. Now the victim (in this case our user) tries to open that file (in this case the image) through a preinstalled software on his machine like a image viewer. Now this image viewer is vulnerable by the binary planting attack. Now the image viewer may require a DLL file to load dynamically. As the full path name gas not been specified before hand, image viewer will give instructions to Microsoft Windows to search for the required DLL file in a particular order. Directories in order: Working directory The system directory The 16-bit system directory Windows directory Current directory Directories which are listed in PATH environment variables Usually Current directory is the directory in which the image viewer file is stored. Now the attacker has control over one of the directories which windows search for, and hence he will be able to place a malicious copy of the dll in that directory. In such a case the application will load and run the malicious DLL without verification. And now the attacker has gained full control of the affected machine, and now he will be able to perform all the unwanted actions on the machine such as hack into the existing account, create a new account, access important files on specific directories and more. In such a case web securities like firewall has become an essential instrument to block and prevent the downloading of such malicious files from a remote network location. 6.3 TARGETS: The easiest and the most obvious targets for DLL spoofing are the machines running on windows. As here the registry has not been properly updated with a safe-search order for loading DLLs. The safe-search order is not an issue for the PCs running on XP as there are few infectious program and registries which point to fake DLLs or the DLLs which do not even exist. Such program or entries are the real cause of spoofing in the case of XP. Trojans, web caches and email are some of the ways in which codes are placed in the file system. Since obviously having a misconfigured programs or the search path does not mean that the machine will start running malicious code. As we know this breach is more harmful then the DLL spoof as ordinary user can easily place malicious file in the current folder like in Shared Documents. So when another user with privileged rights opens the document in the same directory, then this directory will become the Current Directory for the machine it will search for the DLLs before the system directory and hence allowing the ordinary user to operate the machine with privileged rights. Now one may ask that simply placing the DLL in the shared directory or a web cache will not allow it to be loaded, for the DLLs to be loaded they must be kept in either of system directory, the application directory or a path provided by the application that tries to load the DLL. So the answer is that being able to write to system and application file space already implies administrator privileges so there would be no need for DLL spoofing. Hence it arises the need of online security against the spoofing and accessing to administrator privileges. Now one may ask that simply placing the DLL in the shared directory or a web cache will not allow it to be loaded, for the DLLs to be loaded they must be kept in either of system directory, the application directory or a path provided by the application that tries to load the DLL. So the answer is that being able to write to system and application file space already implies administrator privileges so there would be no need for DLL spoofing. Hence arises the need of online security against the spoofing and accessing to administrator privileges. 6.4 PROTECTION: Microsoft Windows install auxiliary services like FTP server, telnet and web server which are not critical. If those services which are not needed by the administrator are removed then the threat is reduced at once. Microsoft, which we already know seems to have greatest problem with spoofing, tries to solve this problem using their Microsoft Authenticode Certificates. Well Microsoft needs to update DLLs continuously as outdated DLL could be dangerous in this world of hackers.Now the question arises that how we know that this DLLs are updated. Microsoft solved this problem with Microsoft 2000, by digitally signing the drivers by Windows Hardware Quality Lab(WHQL) tests. The drivers that passed were given a Microsoft digital signature. As mentioned earlier, in the present time this signing is done with Microsoft Authenticode Certificates. An authorized signer is used for these purpose which is known as thwarted. In present time many designers came up with a variety of tamper resistance. They concluded that even though a particular approach may seem effective, only Microsoft would have the resources, scope and platform control to make it practical . Here are two concepts which contain handling of drivers: Protected Path: Specifically known as PVP (Protected Video Path) and PUMA (Protected User Mode Audio). These are the mechanism used to support DRM (Digital Rights Management) rules about safe content presentations. Protected Environment: It is a kernel mechanism to ensure that kernel-mode drivers are safe for protected contents. These drivers should be signed by Microsoft and must implement specific security functions. All the kernel-mode drivers should be signed to ensure there safe origin and also that they are not tampered with. New mechanisms like OCP (Output Content Protection) are used in the versions after Windows Vista. Though at higher level OCPs Protected Path and Protected Environment make sense but it includes great complexity, management process and supporting infrastructure. Also implementation of OCP means device drivers get numerous new security responsibilities. Going back to DLL, a new complexity is revocation. Authorization is not useful unless it can be revoked when a compromise is discovered. For this Microsoft runs a revocation infrastructure that distributes a Microsoft Global Revocation List to identify no longer authorized driver software. Software revocation is problematic because of potential effect on users who may suddenly be unable to play content through no fault of their own. So revocation is likely to occur well, only after updates are distributed. So we have seen that after all the measures used by Microsoft, there is a long window of content vulnerability SECTION 7 IP SPOOFING 7.1 INTRODUCTION: IP spoofing refers to the creation of Internet Protocol (IP) packets with a forged source IP address, called spoofing, with the p

Campus Security †Research paper Essay

Campus security is an ever-growing concern throughout the United States. Parents want their children to be safe while continuing their education away from home and students want to feel and be safe while living on campus. The University of Maryland at College Park has had a constant battle with campus security as incidences have increased on and around campus. The University of Maryland is located between Washington D.C. and Baltimore, a â€Å"hotspot†, concentrated with high levels of criminal activity. In 2002 there were 17 sex offenses, 9 robberies, 12 aggravated assaults, 140 burglaries, 86 motor vehicle thefts, 136 drug related arrests, and 9 illegal weapons possession arrests on Maryland’s campus (UMD Crime Statistics). These statistics represent only on campus incidents and have varied tremendously over the past three years. Statistics would be much higher if they included areas around campus. Variations over the years can be attributed to increase in police presence, as well as many security precautions implemented over the past years. Universities have taken many precautions to battle crime on and around campus. â€Å"One of the newest techno-trends on American college and university campuses is tipping campus police to illicit activity by filling out online forms posted on the department’s World Wide Web page† (Campus Crimes†¦). Colleges such as Duke University, the University of Georgia, and MIT have already implemented such programs and have been very successful (Campus Crimes†¦). Narcotics activity and burglaries have seen significant reductions. Students and criminals participating in illicit activities now have to be fearful of other peers who may â€Å"rat† on them. There are, however, downsides to such tactics. False accusations could become a problem. So far, of the 100 universities already using such technology â€Å"90 percent of the information received over the university’s campus police Web site has been ‘significant'† (Campus Crimes†¦). In efforts to reduce students walking alone at night, many universities have implemented night ride programs (Safety and Security). These are curb-to-curb security services, where a campus shuttle bus transports students from one location to another. The University of Maryland offers such a service called N.I.T.E. Ride. N.I.T.E. Ride runs from 5:30pm to 7:30am during fall and spring semesters (Safety and Security). This program combined with the universities safety escort services provides students with opportunities to avoid harmful situations (Safety and Security). However, although many schools offer such programs, they do not allow enough funding to fully equip such safety programs. Many students are unable to get through to the operator, thus end up walking home alone. More shuttles and operators are needed during peek hours, such as weekends and Thursdays. The N.I.T.E. Ride program is an effective means to avoid harmful situations when the program is fully funded. Otherwise, students tend to walk home alone and put themselves in harms way. The University of Maryland also offers an excellent bus system. Students, instead of walking alone at night, can seek the safety of the bus (Policies, Programs, Services). The University of Maryland’s Circuit and Courtyard Express provide safe and dependable rides to various key locations on campus. Not only are students protected from crime, but also are encouraged to ride the bus instead of driving home under the influence. The bus system has dramatically decreased rapes and robberies. Having an alternative ride home also lowers student’s fear of crime by lowering at risk situations. Maryland has also placed blue light emergency phones around campus (Safety and Security). â€Å"Emergency phones provide a direct line to the police throughout the campus both inside and outside many academic buildings and residence halls. These phones are either yellow or encased within a blue cylindrical column and are marked Emergency. Frequently they have blue lights overhead making their locations easier to find. Individuals may contact campus police directly and without charge by activating the phone. This notifies an emergency dispatcher, via a computer, of the caller’s exact location† (Policies, Programs, Services). These phones are used to deter potential victimizations as well as provide a means for communication in  case of an emergency (Safety and Security). The emergency phones may not lower crime rates, but they do lower student’s fear of crime. The installation of video surveillance is another means to combat crime on campus. Throughout the nation universities have been installing cameras to record and monitor specific areas. The University of Maryland initiated this effort in 1996 by installing dozens of cameras in parking lots, garages, high traffic pedestrian areas, isolated areas, and by ATM machines (Schultz). Although the effects of video surveillance to reduce crime have not been established, fear of crime by students has dropped. Cameras are very effective in aiding police dispatchers about crime scenes but rarely catch crimes in action (Schultz). Some students feel that funds would be better spent on police surveillance (Schultz). These students believe criminals will just wear masks or commit crimes where there are no cameras (Schultz). Video surveillance can also be used to aid in criminal investigations. By placing cameras at the entrances and exits to campuses and buildings, police can record license plates as well as faces later used for identification. Although video surveillance may be a useful tool for law enforcement, it is still extremely controversial. Many students feel that surveillance is an infringement on privacy. It can be scary that â€Å"big brother† knows when and where you are at all times. Universities around the globe have offered several programs to students in order to educate and prevent students from placing themselves in at-risk situations. The University of Maryland offers many programs to prevent victimization. One huge program sweeping the nation is Rape Aggression Defense (RAD). RAD is the â€Å"fastest growing and largest women’s self-defense program in the country. This program has structured, consistent curriculum, of easy-to-teach, easy-to-learn techniques that have realistic and practical application† (Policies, Programs, Services). The University also provides personal security presentations as well as sexual assault awareness programs. Services to victims are offered through campus as well as Prince George’s Hospital. The Victim Advocate is a service that â€Å"provides support and referral to victims of sexual assault, sexual harassment, stalking, and partner violence† (Policies, Programs, Services). Prince George’s Hospital  will treat victims of sexual assault and rape as well as provide information, counseling, and companionship (Policies, Programs, Services). There is always a trained nurse on hand that is capable of collecting evidence for future prosecutions (Policies, Programs, Services). Students also should be aware of date rape drugs (Fitzgerald). Never leave glasses unattended and always attend parties in groups (Fitzgerald). Policing is always a vital part to campus safety. The University police provide numerous services to students. Emergency responses to crimes are quickly answered and acted upon (Policies, Programs, Services). Officers provide foot patrol, as well as patrol with marked and unmarked police cars, motorcycles, and bicycles (Policies, Programs, Services). The campus police also relay crime data to the state, FBI, as well as other police agencies (Policies, Programs, Services). Relaying information is an important tool in compiling information to develop the UCR and other crime fighting statistics. The University also has a Crime Investigation Unit (CIU) that â€Å"is responsible for criminal investigations, criminal intelligence, crime analysis, and victim/witness assistance coordination† (Policies, Programs, Services). Over 100 student police aids help campus police in providing a safe environment (Policies, Programs, Services). â€Å"Student Police Aids are non-sworn, unarmed student employees who work part-time for the department. They are provided training and equipment, and act as additional eyes and ears for campus police† (Policies, Programs, Services). Student police Aids are responsible for special event security as well as security around campus (Policies, Programs, Services). These aids have designated foot and bicycle patrols in parking garages and various high-risk areas around campus (Policies, Programs, Services). Aids are also stationed at entrances and exits of campus during late hours. As cars drive onto campus, students record and question inc-coming visitors. These actions deter criminals as well as car thieves. Their license plate numbers are written down and they must have a legitimate destination or student identification in order to gain access to the campus. Awareness is possibly the best solution to crime prevention. â€Å"In 1990, Congress passed the Campus and Securities Act† (Safety by the Numbers). This act requires that any university receiving federal funding to â€Å"disclose campus crime statistics and provide students with information about the schools safety policies† (Safety by the Numbers). By disclosing information, students and parents become aware of any possible crime problem. Students, consequently, can take preventive measures to ensure their safety. Potential students might also elect to go to schools with safer campuses. This places additional pressure on federally funded universities to tighten their campus security. Universities that acquire a reputation as being unsafe often lose student enrollment. â€Å"The 1998 amendments to the Campus Security Act added more categories of crime statistics that schools must disclose. Arson and manslaughter have been added to the list of offenses, which already included murder, sexual assault, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and motor-vehicle theft† (Safety by the Numbers). Schools, however, are not currently required to disclose crimes that occur near campus. Often, statistics are distorted and under-represent true crime (Safety by the Numbers). The key to protection in your dorm room and in an off-campus housing is vigilantism. Always be aware of your surroundings and lock your door at night. Most campuses have installed swipe cards at all entrances, hallways, doorways, and elevators to prevent unauthorized users from gaining access to the building. These swipe cards provide much needed security. In order to gain access someone must let you into the building. â€Å"Additionally, doors with card readers are also equipped with prop monitors that cause a horn to sound in the event a door is propped open or not securely closed and latched† (Policies, Programs, Services). Having RA’s on duty in lobbies of all buildings deters suspicious and unwanted visitors. These RAs can report any shady activity as well as provide emergency assistance. There are numerous ways universities and colleges can combat crime and upgrade campus security. Through online tipping, night ride programs, adequate bus systems, emergency phones, video surveillance, prevention, rape, and victimization programs, policing, awareness, and swipe cards  schools can provide increased campus security.