CRITICAL ISSUES IN INTERNET COMMERCE

In this article the authors identify reliability, privacy, and securit y as critical issues in electronic commerce. In other work, designers of information systems have identified other issues as critical, such as the ability to provide offline verification. It is widely agreed th at an electronic currency system must provide divisibility, scalabilit y in number of users, conservation of money or tamper resistance, exch angeability or interoperability, and availability [1-6]. However, by r eturning to the fundamental definition of money and the essential natu re of electronic information systems, the authors argue that privacy, reliability, and security are also critical issues. It is argued that these issues are particularly important in Internet commerce. The auth ors conclude by noting how some proposed Internet commerce systems pro vide, or fail to provide, security, reliability, and privacy.