Business Processes are considered a crucial issue by many enterprises because they are the key to maintain competitiveness. Moreover, business processes are important for software developers, since they can capture from them the necessary requirements for software design and creation. Besides, business process modeling is the center for conducting and improving how the business is operated. Security is important for business performance, but traditionally, it is considered after the business processes definition. Empirical studies show that, at the business process level, customers, end users, and business analysts are able to express their security needs. In this work, we will present a proposal aimed at integrating security requirements through business process modeling. We will summarize our Business Process Modeling Notation extension for modeling secure business process through Business Process Diagrams, and we will apply this approach to a typical health-care business process.

A BPMN Extension for the Modeling of Security Requirements in Business Processes

A computer implemented system and method determines price and allocation of equity shares. Information about an offering to accept bids for equity shares is provided to qualified potential purchasers and non-qualified potential purchasers. Bids from potential purchasers for equity shares are received through a communication network. Bids are accepted and offered to be accepted only from qualified potential purchasers. A non-qualified potential purchaser submits a bid through a qualified potential purchaser. A clearing price for the offered shares is determined based on the received bids.

Auction system and method for pricing and allocation during capital formation

This paper identifies four security issues (access to Information Systems, secure communication, security management, development of secure Information Systems), and examines the extent to which these security issues have been addressed by existing research efforts. Research contributions in relation to these four security issues are analyzed from three viewpoints: a meta-model for information systems, the research approaches used, and the reference disciplines used. Our survey reveals that most information security research has focused on the technical context, and on issues of access to IS and secure communication. The corresponding security issues have been resolved by using mathematical approaches as a research approach. The reference disciplines most commonly reflected have been mathematics, including philosophical logic. Based on this analysis, we suggest new directions for studying information security from an information systems viewpoint, with respect to research methodology and research questions. Empirical studies in relation to the issues of security management and the development of secure IS, based on suitable reference theories (e.g., psychology, sociology, semiotics, and philosophy), are particularly necessary.

A review of information security issues and respective research contributions

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The Economics of Electronic Commerce

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Structured Systems Analysis: Tools and Techniques

Open electronic markets on the Internet have many advantages compared to traditional markets. A variety of new business models, types of markets and digital products emerge, because they potentially generate revenues. In order to support the realization of secure and fair electronic markets, it is important to address the security risks without lowering the advantages of the Internet. In this work, we describe a model for secure and fair markets, which supports this integrated approach. It considers security and fairness of market transactions, different market forms, digital goods and the impact of different business models. Based on our market model, we developed the COPS infrastructure that provides a framework for designing market transactions, an execution environment for market transactions, different (trusted and non-trusted) services and appropriate security mechanisms to realize secure and fair electronic markets.

COPS: A model and infrastructure for secure and fair electronic markets

Security and fairness in business transactions are basic requirements demanded by any participant in electronic markets. We propose COPS as an infrastructure for building adaptable electronic markets with main focus on security and fairness and MOSS as a methodology for analysing and modelling the security semantics of business transactions. Both are necessary to control the risks involved in dealing (trading) with untrusted parties in an open electronic commerce environment. We address the phases information, negotiation and execution of a business transaction and discuss security requirements which in the past were recognised as being very important for electronic market participants but had only received limited or little attention in the electronic commerce research community.

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Modelling secure and fair electronic commerce

Existing electronic markets in the open network Internet often show a lack of security and fairness. New forms of trading are just coming up and the variety of different market structures and digital goods we will probably see in the future is yet unthinkable. Therefore, an infrastructure for future electronic markets has to support the realization of different market structures by providing secure and fair services in a transparent way and to allow dynamic changes of market structures. For example, it should allow that the market structure changes from an auction to a direct search market on the fly. We first elaborate an electronic market model and use it to describe how an open infrastructure for electronic markets should be realized. Finally we introduce the project COPS (Commercial Protocols and Services) in which we realize an infrastructure for secure and fair electronic markets.

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COPS: a model and infrastructure for secure and fair electronic markets

This article characterizes the tasks that mobile software agents can perform in electronic markets, the risks they entail, and the appropriate protective mechanisms. Market servers have to be protected against malicious agents, and mobile agents have to be protected against malicious hosts. The latter is quite difficult, because a host must be able to read an agent's code and data in order to execute them. Several approaches to protecting mobile agents are surveyed and evaluated, and the possible application fields for each are examined. One of the approaches is used to develop an electronic market architecture for mobile agents that provides market participants with security and anonymity.

Mobile Agents in Electronic Markets: Opportunities, Risks, Agent Protection

Among other areas, electronic commerce includes the fields of electronic markets and workflow management. Workflow management systems are usually used to specify and manage inter- and intra-organisational business processes. Although workflow management techniques are capable of specifying and conducting at least parts of market transactions, these techniques are not or are very rarely used for this purpose yet. In both fields, users demand security and integrity to protect for example their privacy, their property rights or digital payments. To satisfy these security demands, a variety of existing security services, mechanisms, protocols, and organisational measures may be used. On the one hand, to encourage using these techniques it is necessary to have a tool which enables a firm's executive to formulate market transaction security demands at a high abstraction level. On the other hand, executing market transactions needs a more formal, machine readable description of the transaction and its security requirements. We present a methodology to specify secure protocols, which are usable to automatically conduct business processes, as well as market transactions.

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Alexander W. Röhm

Papers

COPS: A model and infrastructure for secure and fair electronic markets

Modelling secure and fair electronic commerce

COPS: a model and infrastructure for secure and fair electronic markets

Mobile Agents in Electronic Markets: Opportunities, Risks, Agent Protection

A language for modelling secure business transactions