NIPUN SEHRAWAT [ BMS 2D, 13173 ]

RESEARCH PROPOSAL
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
As technology improves, people purchase more goods without leaving the house. How
can they do this? They can do this via the Internet and can buy anything from different
countries. Online purchasing really brings out another shopping market place to society.
However, how can the consumers feel comfortable and safe after placing their orders
online without worrying that his/her credit cards might be used in other transactions?
How can users trust a third party and be willing to make the order online. This issue has
become a problem for the retail industry.
This research will focus on all the information related to the electronic commerce (eCommerce) and list all the pros and cons for different online shopping styles. In addition,
the difficulties for online purchasing behaviors will be analized.

BACKGROUND OF THE PROBLEM

As technology improves, the Internet and World Wide Web (WWW) have been used for
commercial purposes increasingly. People start their business by putting the goods on
the Internet and creating the website to show people their products in order to sell. In
addition, this market becomes better and widely opens up to everyone in the world.
However, the biggest issue of this market is still security and so far there is no good
solution for this. How do people know this online purchasing is worry-free? How much
security is enough for the online business? Those are the issues that people are still
arguing about, which will be discussed in the next sections.
Before using the computer system or installing new software, a prudent organization will
check the system in order to ensure that it provides enough security. An organization can
determine the security of a computing system by measuring the cost of finding and
exploiting a security vulnerability in that system. This measurement is most effective
when people also know how much security the organization requires. In order to answer
how much security is enough, one must first determine what types of advantages are
needed in order to defend against the hackers and what choices are for each adversary
type.
However, the current rapid development for both the new Information Technology and
the e-Commerce has resulted in a strong demand for reliable and secure copyright
protection techniques for multimedia data . Two of the recent solutions introduced here
would be the design of buyer-seller watermarking protocol without trusted third party,
and browser spoofing attach, which can break the weakest link from the server to use.
The following research seeks to study the viability of making a e-commerce more safe
and different opinions about how to figure out the solutions or vulnerabilities for eCommerce.

PROBLEM STATEMENT
The present study seeks to understand the security of a consumer on e commerce web
sites, to know how secure it is to make payments / do transactions on the internet where
there is a high risk of fraud and hackers and what is a solution to it.

ASSUMPTION AND HYPOTHESES

We assume that there is a security worry on internet for businesses and consumers on ecommerce websites from hackers etc which can be resolved by stringent rules and better
security softwares.
Hypotheses: there is always a security threat while making transactions
online.

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE
1. Determine the problems which the consumers and businesses are currently facing.
2. This would involve a broad stakeholder analysis involving the internet users, the
businesses and the industry.
3. Enquiring about the degree of acceptability of the solution that we seek to offer.
4. Estimating the demand of new laws and softwares.
5. This would be done for both online and offline products.
6. It will also involve a study of the existing systems in place which cater to such
activities.
7. Estimating the price the people are willing to pay and understanding the current
pricing trends.
8. SWOT of all the existing laws and anti theft softwares.
9. Forecasting and valuation of of rules and anti theft softwares.

RESEARCH DESIGN
Understanding the consumers mindset regarding the security worries that they are
facing to provide a stable and robust internet surfing experience.
At the exploratory stage of the study, for the identification of consumers needs, surveys
will be conducted and based on semi structured interviews; classification of the services
will be made, in order of the priority given by the consumers themselves. After this, the
demand for this will be studied.
Stage 1 - This would involve a collection of secondary data from journals, newspapers,
surveys done previously by companies, etc. This would prove helpful in estimating the
cumulative industry size and the seriousness of the problem.
Stage 2 - This stage will consist of primary research will be conducted in 3 phases1. Expert opinion sample survey programmers, corporates and established
consumers will be interviewed and brainstormed to collect information about
the system and its deficiency.
Sample size: 5 programmers: 5 corporates: 10 consumers from.
2. Consumer study - consumers from diverse fields will be included for studying
the problem.
Sample size: 3 consumers of different needs and purchasing behaviour.
3. Suppliers analysis: detailed study of the corporate inclination will be carried.

Sample size: 10 leading e-commerce businesses online.

Stage 3 - Pricing of new safety services, softwares and implementation of new rules and
laws: current practices of the prices will be examined and sensitivity analysis can be
conducted for fixing the prices by considering variables such as demand, reach, profit to
the corporate and importance of the product in the minds of consumers.
Data processing will be done with help of research associates and by using appropriate
software analysis.

SCHEDULING THE RESEARCH

The research shall take a total duration of 31 days. The schedule given below shows
activity wise distribution of the same:
STAG
E
Stage
1

Stage
2
Stage
3

ACTIVITY

DURATION (in days)

Exploratory study
Secondary data
collection
Preparation of
questionnaires
Pilot survey
Expert opinion survey
Consumer survey
Price sensitivity analysis
Data processing
Data analysis
First draft report
Final project report

5
2
2
4
2
3
4
3
2
2
2

RESULTS AND OUTCOMES

The researchs outcomes shall be helpful in the following ways:
Findings will be in measuring the viability of introducing new rules or security softwares.
Findings will be helpful to companies already existing in this market to revamp thir
security protocol and introduce new safety features.
Findings will also help in charting out the consumers online purchasing behaviour.

COSTING AND BUDGETING

The expenditure to be incurred in order to execute the research is tabulated below:
NAME OF EXPENDITURE
Salaries/honorarium
Stationary
Printing
Electricity

AMOUNT INR
10,000
1,000
1,000
5,000

Transportation
Rent (for setting up stalls in malls for
consumer surveys)
Telephone charges
Laptops (two)
TOTAL

10,000
10,000
5,000
60,000
1,07,000

REFERENCES
The following literature shall serve as references and guidelines in the research:
Analysis for E-Commerce -- Focusing on Online Purchasing in Taiwan ECE578 Final Project
Report by Dr. Cetin Kaya Koc and Wen-Chun Yang, Oregon State University.
NIPUN SEHRAWAT [ BMS 2D, 13173 ]