IT General Controls (ITGC)

[edit] Other peripherals

In addition, hardware devices can include external components of a computer system. The following are either standard or very common.

Includes various input and output devices, usually external to the computer system.

[edit] Input

• 
  Text input devices
  
  • 
    Keyboard - a device to input text and characters by depressing buttons (referred to as keys), similar to a typewriter. The most common English-language key layout is the QWERTY layout.
    
• 
  Pointing devices
  
  • 
    Mouse - a pointing device that detects two dimensional motion relative to its supporting surface.
    
  • 
    Optical Mouse - a newer technology that uses lasers, or more commonly LEDs to track the surface under the mouse to determine motion of the mouse, to be translated into mouse movements on the screen.
    
  • 
    Trackball - a pointing device consisting of an exposed protruding ball housed in a socket that detects rotation about two axes.
    

• 
  Gaming devices
  
  • 
    Joystick - a general control device that consists of a handheld stick that pivots around one end, to detect angles in two or three dimensions.
    
  • 
    Gamepad - a general handheld game controller that relies on the digits (especially thumbs) to provide input.
    
  • 
    Game controller - a specific type of controller specialized for certain gaming purposes.
    
• 
  Image, Video input devices
  
  • 
    Image scanner - a device that provides input by analyzing images, printed text, handwriting, or an object.
    
  • 
    Webcam - a low resolution video camera used to provide visual input that can be easily transferred over the internet.
    
• 
  Audio input devices
  
  • 
    Microphone - an acoustic sensor that provides input by converting sound into electrical signals.
    

Hash functions are primarily used in hash tables, to quickly locate a data record (for example, a dictionary definition) given its search key (the headword). Specifically, the hash function is used to map the search key to the hash. The index gives the place where the corresponding record should be stored. Hash tables, in turn, are used to implement associative arrays and dynamic sets.

In general, a hashing function may map several different keys to the same index. Therefore, each slot of a hash table is associated with (implicitly or explicitly) a set of records, rather than a single record. For this reason, each slot of a hash table is often called a bucket, and hash values are also called bucket indices.

Thus, the hash function only hints at the record's location — it tells where one should start looking for it. Still, in a half-full table, a good hash function will typically narrow the search down to only one or two entries.

A hot site is a duplicate of the original site of the organization, with full computer systems as well as near-complete backups of user data. Real time synchronization between the two sites may be used to completely mirror the data environment of the original site using wide area network links and specialized software. Following a disruption to the original site, the hot site exists so that the organization can relocate with minimal losses to normal operations. Ideally, a hot site will be up and running within a matter of hours or even less. Personnel may still have to be moved to the hot site so it is possible that the hot site may be operational from a data processing perspective before staff has relocated. The capacity of the hot site may or may not match the capacity of the original site depending on the organizations requirements. This type of backup site is the most expensive to operate. Hot sites are popular with organizations that operate real time processes such as financial institutions, government agencies and ecommerce providers

Hyper Text Markup Language(HTML) is the encoding scheme used to create and format a web document. A user need not be an expert programmer to make use of HTML for creating hypertext documents that can be put on the internet.

Examples of generalized audit software are Audit Command Language (ACL), Interactive Data Extraction and Analysis (IDEA), Statistical Analysis System (SAS), and Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). TopCAATs is a new player (released Q4 2008) in this market and runs from within Excel.

Information is a term with many meanings depending on context, but is as a rule closely related to such concepts as meaning, knowledge, instruction, communication, representation, and mental stimulus. Simply stated, information is a message received and understood. In terms of data, it can be defined as a collection of facts from which conclusions may be drawn. There are many other aspects of information since it is the knowledge acquired through study or experience or instruction. But overall, information is the result of processing, manipulating and organizing data in a way that adds to the knowledge of the person receiving it.

Information is a quality of a message from a sender to one or more receivers. Information is always about something (size of a parameter, occurrence of an event, value, ethics, etc). Viewed in this manner, information does not have to be accurate; it may be a truth or a lie, or just the sound of a falling tree. Even a disruptive noise used to inhibit the flow of communication and create misunderstanding would in this view be a form of information. However, generally speaking, if the amount of information in the received message increases, the message is more accurate.

This model assumes there is a definite sender and at least one receiver. Many refinements of the model assume the existence of a common language understood by the sender and at least one of the receivers. An important variation identifies information as that which would be communicated by a message if it were sent from a sender to a receiver capable of understanding the message. In another variation, it is not required that the sender be capable of understanding the message, or even cognizant that there is a message, making information something that can be extracted from an environment, e.g., through observation, reading or measurement.

Input Controls

IT application or program controls are fully-automated (i.e., performed automatically by the systems) designed to ensure the complete and accurate processing of data, from input through output. These controls vary based on the business purpose of the specific application. These controls may also help ensure the privacy and security of data transmitted between applications. Categories of IT application controls may include:

• 
  Completeness checks - controls that ensure all records were processed from initiation to completion.
  
• 
  Validity checks - controls that ensure only valid data is input or processed.
  
• 
  Identification - controls that ensure all users are uniquely and irrefutably identified.
  
• 
  Authentication - controls that provide an authentication mechanism in the application system.
  
• 
  Authorization - controls that ensure only approved business users have access to the application system.
  
• 
  Problem management - controls that ensure all application problems are recorded and managed in a timely manner.
  
• 
  Change management - controls that ensure all changes on production environment are implemented with preserved data integrity.
  
• 
  Input controls - controls that ensure data integrity fed from upstream sources into the application system.
  

The terms information security, computer security and information assurance are frequently incorrectly used interchangeably. These fields are interrelated often and share the common goals of protecting the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information; however, there are some subtle differences between them.

These differences lie primarily in the approach to the subject, the methodologies used, and the areas of concentration. Information security is concerned with the confidentiality, integrity and availability of data regardless of the form the data may take: electronic, print, or other forms.

Computer security can focus on ensuring the availability and correct operation of a computer system without concern for the information stored or processed by the computer.

Governments, military, corporations, financial institutions, hospitals, and private businesses amass a great deal of confidential information about their employees, customers, products, research, and financial status. Most of this information is now collected, processed and stored on electronic computers and transmitted across networks to other computers.

Should confidential information about a business' customers or finances or new product line fall into the hands of a competitor, such a breach of security could lead to lost business, law suits or even bankruptcy of the business. Protecting confidential information is a business requirement, and in many cases also an ethical and legal requirement.

For the individual, information security has a significant effect on privacy, which is viewed very differently in different cultures.

The field of information security has grown and evolved significantly in recent years. As a career choice there are many ways of gaining entry into the field. It offers many areas for specialization including: securing network(s) and allied infrastructure, securing applications and databases, security testing, information systems auditing, business continuity planning and digital forensics science, to name a few.

The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standardized Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP) to serve billions of users worldwide. It is a network of networks that consists of millions of private and public, academic, business, and government networks of local to global scope that are linked by copper wires, fiber-optic cables, wireless connections, and other technologies. The Internet carries a vast array of information resources and services, most notably the inter-linked hypertext documents of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the infrastructure to support electronic mail. In addition it supports popular services such as online chat, file transfer and file sharing, gaming, commerce, social networking, publishing, video on demand, and teleconferencing and telecommunications. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) applications allow person-to-person communication via voice and video.

The origins of the Internet reach back to the 1960s when the United States funded research projects of its military agencies to build robust, fault-tolerant and distributed computer networks. This research and a period of civilian funding of a new U.S. backbone by the National Science Foundation spawned worldwide participation in the development of new networking technologies and led to the commercialization of an international network in the mid 1990s, and resulted in the following popularization of countless applications in virtually every aspect of modern human life. As of 2009, an estimated quarter of Earth's population uses the services of the Internet
Intranet

An intranet is built from the same concepts and technologies used for the Internet, such as client-server computing and the Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP). Any of the well known Internet protocols may be found in an intranet, such as HTTP (web services), SMTP (e-mail), and FTP (file transfer). Internet technologies are often deployed to provide modern interfaces to legacy information systems hosting corporate data.

An intranet can be understood as a private version of the Internet, or as a private extension of the Internet confined to an organization by a firewall. The first intranet websites and home pages began to appear in organizations in 1990 - 1991. Although not officially noted, the term intranet first became common-place with early adopters, such as universities and technology corporations, in 1992.

Intranets are also contrasted with extranets; the former are generally restricted to employees of the organization, while the latter may also be accessed by customers, suppliers, or other approved parties.^[1] Extranets extend a private network onto the Internet with special provisions for access, authorization, and authentication.

An organization's intranet does not necessarily have to provide access to the Internet. When such access is provided it is usually through a network gateway with a firewall, shielding the intranet from unauthorized external access. The gateway often also implements user authentication, encryption of messages, and often virtual private network (VPN) connectivity for off-site employees to access company information, computing resources and internal communications.
Local Area Network (LAN)

is a computer network covering a small physical area, like a home, office, or small group of buildings, such as a school, or an airport. The defining characteristics of LANs, in contrast to wide-area networks (WANs), include their usually higher data-transfer rates, smaller geographic area, and lack of a need for leased telecommunication lines.

ARCNET, Token Ring and many other technologies have been used in the past, and G.hn may be used in the future, but Ethernet over twisted pair cabling, and Wi-Fi are the two most common technologies currently in use.
Macro

Keyboard macros and mouse macros allow short sequences of keystrokes and mouse actions to be transformed into other, usually more time-consuming, sequences of keystrokes and mouse actions. In this way, frequently-used or repetitive sequences of keystrokes and mouse movements can be automated. Separate programs for creating these macros are called macro recorders.

During the 1980s, macro programs -- originally SmartKey, then SuperKey, KeyWorks, Prokey -- were very popular, first as a means to automatically format screenplays, then for a variety of user input tasks. These programs were based on the TSR (Terminate and stay resident) mode of operation and applied to all keyboard input, no matter in which context it occurred. They have to some extent fallen into obsolescence following the advent of mouse-driven user interface and the availability of keyboard and mouse macros in applications, such as word processors and spreadsheets, which makes it possible to create application-sensitive keyboard macros.

Keyboard macros have in more recent times come to life as a method of exploiting the economy of massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG)s. By tirelessly performing a boring, repetitive, but low risk action, a player running a macro can earn a large amount of the game's currency. This effect is even larger when a macro-using player operates multiple accounts simultaneously, or operates the accounts for a large amount of time each day. As this money is generated without human intervention, it can dramatically upset the economy of the game by causing runaway inflation. For this reason, use of macros is a violation of the TOS or EULA of most MMORPGs, and administrators of MMORPGs fight a continual war to identify and punish macro users^[3].

[edit] Application macros and scripting

The programmers' text editor Emacs (short for "editing macros") follows this idea to a conclusion. In effect, most of the editor is made of macros. Emacs was originally devised as a set of macros in the editing language TECO; it was later ported to dialects of Lisp.

Another programmer's text editor Vim (a descendant of vi) also has full implementation of macros. It can record into a register (macro) what a person types on the keyboard and it can be replayed or edited just like VBA macros for Microsoft Office. Also it has a scripting language called Vimscript^[4] to create macros.^[5]

Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) is a programming language included in Microsoft Office and some other applications. However, its function has evolved from and replaced the macro languages that were originally included in some of these applications.

[edit] Macro virus

VBA has access to most Microsoft Windows system calls and executes when documents are opened. This makes it relatively easy to write computer viruses in VBA, commonly known as macro viruses. In the mid-to-late 1990s, this became one of the most common types of computer virus. However, during the late 1990's and to date, Microsoft has been patching and updating their programs. In addition, current anti-virus programs immediately counteract such attacks.