Analysis of the Problem
Understanding the business environment
and the IT impact on iPremier is critical to analyze different
aspects of the problem. Therefore we have used a group of matrixes (
Appendix B
) to investigate the
situation and provided the following insights. The “product/market” analysis shows how iPremie
r is
serving a niche market of affluent customers by providing them with high value products; this suggests
that upsetting these clients
due to
lack of security
measures in safeguarding their data and
credit card
information
will cost iPremier a fortune
!
Furthermore; the ”IT impact matrix” shows IT being the core of
iPremier’s business and any failure for even a
very short duration
will cause losses and
have a
negative
consequence both internally and externally. Moreover the “coupling interaction matrix” s
hows that
iPremier’s IT processes are reasonably tight and complex; which suggests that the whole business can
easily go down if one par
t of its IT is not functioning, like the DOS Attack (Appendix C)
.Also ,when
applying the “governance &ownership analys
is” we notice that the outsourcing relationship places
iPremier in the alliance form of ownership; this implies that the backbone of iPremier is not within its
own hand therefore selecting reliable outsourcer is imperative
for its proper
functioning
.
To g
ain a holistic view
and to gain an insight into iPremier’s situation
a SWOT
analysis (
A
ppendix
D
)
was
done
.
Despite their strengths
, a SWOT analysis
revealed
that iPremier’s main weakness resides on
its lack for a Total Productive Maintenance
approach (
T
PM)
which in turn sheds light on
three other
major
weaknesses
: absence of a reliable IT provider, deficiencies in internal communication &
escalation,
and
the absence of detailed transaction logs. Because of its weaknesses iPremier
was
susceptible to many
threats,
major
ones being increased vulnera
bility toward security breaches, increased chances of repeated
attacks, and higher probability of declining IT performance.
(Appendix E
shows the TPM pillars
)
Apart from that iPremier also has to worry about the legal aspects, public relations as well as the impact
on stock price after the attack. It might be liable for identity theft of its customers
and responsible for
legal actions as well. In light of all th
is the stock price of the firm may also go down.