Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing in a
Healthcare IT Firm: The Case of Ricerro Communications
Wingyan Chung, School of Business & Economics, Fayetteville State University,
USA, wchung@uncfsu.edu
Lewis Hershey, School of Business & Economics, Fayetteville State University, USA
lhershey@uncfsu.edu
ABSTRACT
Information privacy and data sharing are two conflicting but important data
management concerns. As more data are shared among stakeholders, the design of
information systems (IS) often emphasizes on data sharing at the expense of
information privacy. Unfortunately, existing IS research on designing tools to
enhance information privacy is isolated from actual use of the tools. In this research,
we examined the design of a data sharing system in a real-world company. The
company, Ricerro Communications, Inc., produces and markets wearable
communications devices used mainly in healthcare organizations. Poor data sharing
in Ricerro’s multiple systems resulted in loss of information privacy and security and
inefficiency, seriously affecting customer relationship management. A consulting team
has analyzed Ricerro’s needs, gathered stakeholder requirements, and developed a
privacy-enhancing data integration solution, which consists of database schema
integration and data migration from various sources to a Web-based transaction
processing system. Through this industry case, we illustrate how our developed
principles and guidelines for designing IT artifacts incorporate the benefits of
information privacy and data sharing.
KEY WORDS
Information Privacy, Data Sharing, Data Integration, Healthcare IT, CRM,
Design-Science Research, Business Intelligence.
PROLOGUE
Ricerro’s1 CFO, Daniel Morgan, and IT Director, Carl Silver, were meeting in one of
the company’s conference rooms.
1
While all organizations, people, and details mentioned in the case study are real,
their names are fictitious due to a non-disclosure agreement. A list of abbreviations
used in this research is shown in Appendix 1.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
“Ricerro is growing quickly,” Daniel said, “but I am getting complaints from sales and
administration about data privacy problems causing big headaches.”
“What headaches are you talking about?” Carl asked.
“I heard that customer data on software licenses and maintenance are not protected
properly. Data privacy is lost and inaccuracy occurs in the process. They tell me
stories about multiple versions of customer private data are available in Excel sheet,
database, and paper format, some of which are accessible by unauthorized users in the
company. They are even having trouble determining which information is correct, and
they have to manually transfer this data between databases. What IT is doing with the
budget they are given??” Daniel replied.
Carl felt that he might not have enough time to tackle this problem and said, “Ok, I
know people at Mission Consulting Group (MCG) that may be able to help us come
up with a solution. Would the company be willing to support MCG as they work with
us?”
“Sure, I am looking forward to seeing accurate data being made available in a timely
and secure manner.” Daniel replied.
INTRODUCTION
Information privacy and data sharing are two conflicting but important data
management concerns. Data sharing aims at providing convenient, ubiquitous access
and use of data. A major reason for the existence of information technology (IT) is to
facilitate sharing of data and information. Database technologies, data integration
software, and business intelligence tools are developed to support this important task.
Customers can use shared data to track the orders they placed. Managers can use
accurate and timely data to make the right decisions. Suppliers access these shared
data to ensure their procurement and delivery are on-time and correct. Despite the
benefits of sharing data, adoption of IT for healthcare application is not without its
problems. For one, information privacy can be compromised in data sharing.
As more data are shared among stakeholders, information privacy increasingly
becomes a concern. Information privacy is the desire of individuals to have influence
or control over data about themselves (Belanger, Hiller, & Smith, 2002). Bady (2011)
traced back the history of privacy law since 1890 and found that modern technology
development has consistently removed protection for information privacy. As
contemporary information technologies continue to suppress information privacy,
Bady concluded that new countervailing technologies are needed to enable privacy to
survive.
In this research, we examine through a real-world company case the design of
information systems (IS) that could simultaneously enhance both data sharing and
information privacy. We conducted a literature review to examine usual security and
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
privacy issues in healthcare IT firms and design of privacy-enhancing data integration
solutions. We present a case study about a healthcare IT firm and describe the solution
developed to address data sharing and information privacy. Case studies involving a
single organization are not new (Zafar, 2011; Yin, 2008). We provide technical details
in the design process and distill the systems design principles and guidelines. The
results should contribute to the design science academic community and the IT
development practice, especially concerning data sharing and information privacy.
LITERATURE REVIEW
In this section, we review security and privacy issues in healthcare data sharing that is
served by the firm described in our case. We also review prior works on the design of
privacy-enhancing information systems that relate to our research goals.
Security and Privacy Issues in Healthcare Data Sharing
Concerns about maintaining patient privacy when adopting IT solutions for healthcare
systems involve several key areas such as organizational-level issues, individual-level
issues, authentication, and privacy protection. Regarding organizational and protection
issues, Winker et al. (2000) note the difficulty of developing and enforcing uniform
standards for Web-based information that both enhances the physician-patient
relationship and protects patient privacy. Regarding such enhancement, Tang, Ash,
Bates, Overhage, & Sands (2006) report that the integration of personal health records
(PHR) with electronic health records (EHR) systems allows patients to become active
participants in improving their own healthcare outcomes. Despite the advantages of
such integration, the authors note that the very act of combining such systems exposes
the patient’s records to possible compromise of private information. As such, the need
for authentication for access becomes paramount. Echoing concern for authentication
issues, Vest & Gamm (2010) survey two decades of efforts to create comprehensive
health information exchanges (HIE) to improve communication across fragmented
patient records across medical specialties and identify concerns about security as a
continuing issue.
Yet advances in IT design and implementation are showing inroads into authentication
concerns. For example, Ge, Ahn, Unde, Gage, & Carr (2013) address privacy
concerns in the sharing of medical imagery by use of Patient Controlled Access-key
REgistry (PCARE), whereby the patient provides digital access to identified providers
who then can access the imagery data directly via electronic delivery.
Furthermore, the issue of privacy itself may be of less concern for some patient groups
than others or than for providers. For example, Hassol et al. (2004) report little
concern among patients about breach of confidentiality in the use of electronic
communications (email and web-based texting) in a survey of 4,282 registered
patients. However, potential healthcare delivery outcomes may arise due to
differences between patient preferences for mode of communication (email and
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
texting) and those of physicians (telephone). These differences are exacerbated by the
fact that the preferred mode of communication for each group is the least preferred
mode of the other. Table 1 summarizes the main findings.
Table 1. Ongoing Security and Privacy Issues Regarding Healthcare Data Sharing
Issue
Research
Winker, et al. (2000)
Tang, et al. (2006); Vest &
Gamm (2010)
Seto & Friedman (2012)
Finding
Lack of industry-wide standards
Personal records necessarily uniquely
identifiable
Organizational
Level Issues
Fragmentation across medical specialties
Increased efficiencies and effectiveness
Payne et al. (2012)
possible
Patient-physician differences in
Hassol, et al. (2004)
preferences for modes of communication
Individual Level
Issues
Useful integration across IT creates risk
Tang, et al. (2006)
for privacy compromise
Authentication
Ge, et al. (2013)
Use of patient controlled access keys
Use of patient controlled access keys
Ge, et al. (2013)
Privacy
Malin, Emam, & O'Keefe, Informatics innovations improve data
Protection
(2013); Ohno-Macado (2013) sharing while enhance privacy protection
While risks to patient privacy are an on-going concern, adoption of the state of the art
information technologies in the healthcare industry is critically important for at least
two reasons: costs savings and improved healthcare delivery. Regarding cost savings,
Hillestad et al. (2005) note the inefficiency of the U.S. Healthcare System and
estimate that adoption and implementation of modern IT infrastructure could save $81
billion per year. Similarly, Payne, et al. (2012) identify substantial cost savings in the
use of healthcare IT, not only in increased efficiencies for current treatments, but also
in the support for developing new models of healthcare delivery systems. Along these
lines, Woolhandler, Campbell, & Himmelstein (2003) compare discrepancies in cost
structure between U.S. and Canadian healthcare administration systems and advocate
savings for U.S. healthcare by adopting the Canadian model.
Regarding health safety issues, Schnipper et al. (2012) studied the use of electronic
personal health record (PHR) linked medications for accuracy and safety against
traditional record keeping control groups and found improvements in both
administration of the correct dosage and a decrease in potentially harmful effects from
unexplained discrepancies between prescription and actual medication given.
Similarly, Apparil, Carian, Johnson, & Anthony (2012) studied the use of
computerized physician order entry (CPOE) and electronic medication administration
records (eMAR) for monitoring medication order delivery effectiveness and found the
use of eMAR alone or in combination with CPOE to improve adherence to guidelines.
However, despite improvements in health delivery safety, adoption of IT for health
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
systems is not without its problems. For example, while Seto & Friedman (2012)
recognize the value of sharing electronic health records (EHRs) across computerbased platforms, they note the difficulty implementing file sharing standards across
differing medical specialties.
Design of Privacy-Enhancing Data Integration Solutions
Information privacy is an active research area within the information systems and
computer science research communities. Privacy and trust issues are important yet
frequently ignored concerns among systems designers and researchers. While many
companies might have an explicit company privacy policy, few do so at the design
level (Lahlou, Langheinrich, & Röcker, 2005). This is a significant issue, especially in
the early stages of technological development, as design decisions have far-reaching
consequences for the future costs of privacy protection within the system. According
to Lahlou, et al. (2005), the design of adequate solutions will succeed only if privacyrelated problems are methodically approached from the initial stages of development.
In the “Disappearing Computing” initiative, nine guidelines for information systems
design were developed (Lahlou & Jegou, 2004): “think before doing,” “revisit classic
solutions,” “openness,” “privacy razor,” “third-party guarantee,” “make risky
operations expensive,” “avoid surprise,” consider time” and “good privacy is not
enough.” Although privacy is a key design issue, the advocated guidelines are too
general to be applicable to companies that have complex data sharing requirements;
such as in healthcare IT firms.
The Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association recently published a
special issue on public sharing of medical informatics data while protecting individual
privacy (Malin, Emam, & O'Keefe, 2013; Ohno-Macado, 2013). The issue contains
papers grouped into socio-legal track and technical track, each offering examples of
sharing public healthcare data in a privacy-preserving manner (through deidentification, e.g., as in the PopData project (Hertzman, Meagher, & McGrail, 2013))
and providing technical solutions to protecting patients’ privacy when sharing data
(e.g., deriving a secure fingerprint from genomic data (Cassa, Miller, & Mandl,
2013)). Despite the cutting edge informatics research, none of the published papers
describes their outcomes in the context of healthcare IT firms that have complicated
data sharing requirements. In addition, the technical solutions described in some of the
papers are applicable mainly in cryptographic applications but provide limited
guidance for systems design of healthcare IT firms’ data sharing.
After reviewing over 500 articles in information privacy research in information
systems and having coded 142 journal articles and 102 conference proceedings
papers, Belanger and Crossler found few studies in journal articles focusing on design
and action contributions, which could potentially bring a larger impact to real-world
businesses than USA-centric, student-based studies on which existing research relies
heavily (Belanger & Crossler, 2011). Much of research on information privacy tools
and technologies was conducted in isolation from actual future users of the tools.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Therefore, Belanger and Crossler recommended that researchers should conduct more
design and action research, with an eye towards actual implementation. Major
contributions expected from such research are tools and technologies developed from
a design science perspective (Hevner, March, Park, & Ram, 2004). However, the
design of these IT artifacts often emphasizes on data sharing at the expense of
information privacy.
RESEARCH DESIGN
Considering the lack of design-science research on privacy-enhancing data integration
solutions for healthcare IT firms, we conducted a case study research to examine the
principles and guidelines of designing privacy-enhancing data sharing systems
applicable to healthcare IT firms. The case study research method is defined as an
empirical inquiry that investigates a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life
context (Yin, 2008). Case study research brings an understanding of a complex issue
or object and can extend experience or enrich the literature (Soy, 1997). The case
study research method allows researchers to retain the holistic and meaningful
characteristics of real-life events such as the lengthy process of designing and
implementing a complicated data sharing solution in a healthcare IT firm (Yin, 2008).
In this study, we address the following research questions:
1. How can an IT artifact that promotes both data sharing and information
privacy be designed for a healthcare IT company?
2. What stakeholder concerns should be incorporated in the design and
development of a privacy-enhancing data sharing system?
3. What are the principles and guidelines for designing IT artifacts that
incorporate the benefits of information privacy and data sharing?
To answer these questions, we followed an iterative process of describing experience,
describing meaning, and identifying focus of the analysis in our research (Zucker,
2009). We present below the case about the healthcare IT company and describe the
concerns in data sharing and information privacy. We provide technical details in the
design process and distill the systems design principles to answer the research
questions.
RICERRO COMMUNICATIONS, INC.
Located in California’s Silicon Valley, Ricerro Communications, Inc. specializes in
wearable communications devices used mainly in healthcare settings. The company is
young but is growing rapidly, expanding office space, acquiring complementary
businesses, adding product lines, and expanding its IT infrastructure.
Ricerro offers a system designed to streamline communications within organizations.
The core system consists of voice-controllable wireless badges that serve as the
primary communications interface for users, and a software suite that supports system
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
operations, integrates the system with other infrastructure, and provides a
configuration interface for administrators. Additionally, the firm offers software
products that enable third-party devices (such as Blackberry and iPhone) to work with
their system.
The system employs voice recognition, wireless networking, and voice over IP
technologies to facilitate communications among mobile users in a work environment.
For instance, users can call or locate other users by activating their wearable badges,
speaking the desired command (e.g., “call”), and then speaking the target user’s name.
This ability frees users from having to memorize or look up phone numbers and can
shorten the time needed to locate a colleague, which leads to increases in efficiency.
The system also enables broadcast communications to groups of users based on
characteristics like job function. This capability reduces the need for overhead paging
via loudspeakers.
The system can improve communications for organizations in a variety of industries,
but the majority of customers are health care providers for which employing handsfree devices and intelligent communications routing can yield improvements in
workflow, collaboration, and ultimately patient safety (Runyon, Lovelock, Rishel,
Edwards, & Shaffer, 2009).
Ricerro has a CEO/Chairperson, a VP Sales, a VP Services, and a CFO at the
executive level. All technology support and IT staff report to the VP Services, while
all order administrators and finance related staff report to the CFO (see Figure 1 for
key project stakeholders and Appendix 1 for full names of all abbreviations used in
this case). While there are plenty of meetings that bring Ricerro employees together,
there are some problems communicating information across the organization. After
meetings, everyone goes back to whatever problem they were working on.
Information Technology
Ricerro sells the hardware and software components of its communications devices as
well as contracts for maintenance and technical support. Additionally, the company
provides technical support services to its customers. The following section describes
the systems used by Ricerro order administration, technical support, and sales
personnel to support these operations.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Key project stakeholders are highlighted in blue.
Chairman and CEO
VP, Sales
Sales Admin.
Managing Dir., UK
Outside Sales
VP, Services
Service Admin.
Sr. Dir., Tech. Support
Tech. Support
Sr. Service Coord.
Service Admin.
Mgr., IT
IT
Lead Mgmt. Specialist
Marketing
CFO
G&A
Controller
G&A
Executive Asst.
G&A
Sr. Mgr., Sales Operations
Sales Admin.
FP&A Mgr.
G&A
Sr. Order Admin./Sales Support
Sales Admin.
Inside Account Mgr.
Inside Sales
Figure 1. Key Project Stakeholders
Order Processing and Financial Accounting
Order administration personnel track information that supports customer order
processing and financial accounting activities in a database, an enterprise resource
planning system, as well as a spreadsheet that tracks customer software license keys.
These keys, which are required to activate customers’ systems, are generated via a
custom-built License Maker application. Ricerro also uses two software products: one
is a dashboard application that enables the database to track and report on net changes
in customer purchase orders, and the other simplifies the consolidation of financial
data between Ricerro’s domestic and international operations.
Customer Relations Management
Inside sales and technical support staffs primarily use a separate sales database to
track information that underpins sales generation, customer maintenance, and
technical support activities. Project stakeholders have requested extension of this
system to store more information about customers' license growth and software
maintenance contract details.
Additionally, Ricerro’s account managers and technical support staff rely on a
monthly spreadsheet-based report to obtain information about customers’ current
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
system configurations and the terms of their software maintenance contracts. This
information is used to determine when customers should be contacted to initiate
maintenance contract renewals and to identify up-sell opportunities.
Integrative Technologies
At present, much of data sharing between Ricerro’s systems of record is done
manually. However, Ricerro has purchased and started to implement a data integration
tool to help synchronize information between the two systems, with the intention of
providing a more complete view of the customer for customer-facing groups like sales
and technical support.
Data Sharing and Information Privacy Concerns
A general phenomenon challenging the data management is manual data import and
transfer resulting in slow (or lack of) sharing. This can cause businesses to lose
revenue as employees lack the information that was supposed to be communicated to
them. Ricerro faced these problems stemming from manually tracking data in multiple
information sources (license key and software support data were stored in spreadsheet
documents and distributed manually). First, software maintenance term (SWMT) data
was transferred manually between a database and a web-based transaction processing
systems (WTPS), again increasing the potential for errors and data communication
delay issues. Secondly, the processes used to manage customer license keys (LKs)
was not scalable or secure (as it was also tracked manually on spreadsheets). Thirdly,
administration, technical support, and sales users lack ready access to a consolidated
view of customers' system profile (customer accounts, contract, support, and enabled
products) and relevant purchase history (i.e., soon to expire licenses). A customer
profile and relevant purchase history did not include a display of license key (a license
key contains information needed to determine enabled products) or software
maintenance support considerations (the software is what runs these communications
systems used for instance in a hospital). Stakeholders have indicated that the users and
maintainers of LK and SWMT information would benefit from more automated data
transfer and maintenance processes, more flexible data storage methods, and an
interface that consolidates and presents these data as part of a simple display. In
addition, information privacy should be preserved in the sharing process, possibly by
means of password-protected accounts and secure data dissemination.
DATA INTEGRATION SOFTWARE AND SOLUTIONS
Alternatives MCG Considered
Alternatives considered were moving data directly from the GP and License Key
databases to the Web-based Transaction Processing System (WTPS), sending the
License Key data via email to the WTPS and moving the software maintenance term
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
(SWMT) data directly to the WTPS, or sending the License Key data via email to the
WTPS and moving the SWMT data from the financial dataset to the WTPS.
Systems Analysis Processes
In the analysis phase, MCG mapped out the existing systems and stakeholder
processes that were relevant to the user licenses and software purchases. Later MCG
looked at the gathered requirements and “eliminated any redundancies” (Hoffer,
2008).
Stakeholder Requirements Elicitation
MCG interviewed and surveyed company representatives from the different
stakeholder groups individually. From these interviews, MCG developed a set of
requirements and business process models (a set of requirements relating to Service
Contract Purchase/Modification Cases and License Key (LK) Use Cases). MCG
analyzed business processes that involve customer LK and SWMT data, gathered
system requirements from users and other stakeholders, developed and refined
alternative system concepts, and incorporated stakeholder preferences into a final
design concept. Following the selected design concept and requirements, MCG
developed specifications for a solution to automate the transfer of customer LK data
and SWMT data from the new License Database (License DB) system and the
company’s financial database (GP), respectively, to the company’s WTPS instance.
The WTPS is a system used to manage customer purchase details and history to
company sales and support. MCG also developed specifications for the requisite data
storage, workflow, and interface elements in the WTPS system.
A Single View of Customer Profile is Needed Accessible only by Authenticated Users
The information systems did not support ready access to a consolidated view of
information about their customers' system profile and purchase history.
A customer’s current system profile is critical to inside account managers (IAMs) and
order administrators (OAs) because it informs future order processing for that
customer. IAMs use this system profile to provide customers with quotes and OAs use
it to process purchase orders as they are handed off by sales. Additionally, technical
support staff uses system profile information to determine the proper support level for
a given customer. Because this information was distributed among several sources
(i.e., the license tracking spreadsheet and the maintenance tracking spreadsheet) that
are updated manually, users had to check several sources often to find and verify a
customer’s system configuration, which is time consuming.
Information about past customer purchases is valuable to sales teams, which can use it
to more effectively identify opportunities in existing accounts. To access this
information, sales people used a spreadsheet report that was updated monthly using
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
data from another database system. OAs also rely on recent purchase history data to
verify customers’ current system profiles and they may reference other databases
directly, look at the aforementioned maintenance report, or both. While easy to
interpret, the maintenance spreadsheet only represents a monthly snapshot of customer
purchase activity and thus does not contain the most up-to-date information. The
database system does contain the most current information, but the information is
more difficult to find and requires some interpretation.
Overall, personnel in the inside sales, technical support, and sales administration
groups were losing time because customer information often must be parsed manually
or verified among multiple sources.
Management of Software License Key Process Needs to be Scalable and Secure
Software license key (LK) management is a core process. A customer must be issued
a valid LK before invoicing and each key represents information that is critical to
future order processing as well as technical support activities for that customer.
The processes employed to generate and manage LKs involved several manual steps,
which increase the possibility of data entry errors as well as sequencing errors that
complicate order processing. Additionally, LKs were tracked using a spreadsheet
system that lacks referential integrity controls and access controls, putting crucial
information at risk of corruption. Finally, the manual decoding process of each LK is
onerous for those who are not familiar with the LK format and can cause confusion
when the key structure is changed to incorporate new elements.
Software Maintenance Reporting Needs to be Automatic
Data about customer technical support contracts enter the company’s IT systems as
sales transactions and are logged in a Microsoft Dynamics accounting database system
named Great Plains (GP). Each day, the Senior Service Coordinator (SSC) selected
and exported relevant information from GP and then transferred it to an Excel
spreadsheet file, which holds details about the associated customer (such as the report
server configuration they are using) in addition to storing the terms of their support
agreement (e.g., the maintenance expiration date and the number of seats covered).
Once the spreadsheet has been updated, the SSC manually transfers information from
this spreadsheet to the WTPS system, where sales teams can use the information to
identify opportunities.
This process draws too much of the SSC’s time and delays the availability of
information that the sales teams and the customer support teams rely on.
Consequently, increases in activity would have likely challenged the current system
and further compound these issues.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
New or updated maintenance contracts were also extracted from GP each month and
the data was consolidated into a spreadsheet. This spreadsheet contains information on
all customer licenses and also a history of upgrades or downgrades. This spreadsheet
was used by IAM as well as field sales to achieve a holistic view of the customer’s
current standing.
Table 2. Features and Functions Related to LK Integration and SWMT Integration
Ft. #
1.0
2.0
3.0
4.0
5.0
6.0
7.0
8.0
9.0
10.0
11.0
12.0
13.0
14.0
15.0
Description
Automatically transfer LK data from the License DB
to WTPS
Automatically update existing LK records in WTPS
Enable users to manually associate LK records with
one to many WTPS accounts
Track and present historical LK records
Support separation of duties (present LK information
differently based on WTPS user profile)
Provide a standard and component view of LK data in
WTPS
Automatically identify LK to customer account
matches in WTPS
Notify users of upcoming temporary LK expirations
Enable reporting on individual license key fields
Automatically transfer SWMT data from the financial
database to WTPS
Automatically update SWMT data in WTPS
Automatically match SWMT data to customer
accounts in WTPS
Provide an itemized view of SWMT contract
purchases in WTPS
Notify users when there are changes to LK and
SWMT information in WTPS (e.g., data inserts and
updates)
Use the same identifying field for both project data
integrations
Stakeholder Priority
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Nice to Have
Nice to Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Must Have
Nice to Have
Nice to Have
Additionally, GP data is replicated to a database for accounting and reporting
purposes. The service coordinator sends an email monthly to field sales
representatives. This email informs the representatives about their customers’ latest
upgrade or downgrade and includes other important customer license data. This report
helps the sales rep to confirm that a purchase order has been processed and to verify
that the customer received what they ordered, but waiting on this monthly report does
not give the company representatives the information in a timely manner.
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Identified Requirements
Table 2 identifies requirements developed through iterative consultations with
company stakeholders.
Assumptions
In order for MCG to proceed, it had to make some assumptions that Ricerro
confirmed.
 The License database, a MySQL database, will become the system of record
for LK data and will serve as the source of the LK data transferred to the
WTPS.
 Implementation of the License database application is a major dependency for
deployment of the LK data to the WTPS, and Ricerro’s System Test Engineer
will work with MCG to make sure that LK data can be reliably transmitted
from here.
 Ricerro will use an already purchased integration tool to copy SWMT data
from the financial system of record to the WTPS.
 The structure of the financial database will be finalized before integration is
configured to copy SWMT data to the WTPS.
 All customer accounts in the GP system will have representative account
records in the WTPS.
SOFTWARE LICENSING DATA INTEGRATION AT RICERRO
Solution Developed by MCG
Following the selected design concept and requirements, MCG developed
specifications for a solution to automate the transfer of customer LK data and SWMT
data from the new License Database (License DB) system and the company’s
financial database, respectively, to the company’s WTPS instance. The WTPS is a
system used to manage customer purchase details and history of company sales and
support. MCG also developed specifications for the requisite data storage, workflow,
and interface elements in the WTPS system.
As shown in Figure 2, the solution involves importing software maintenance term data
and license key data into the WTPS. The web-based transaction processing system
was chosen because the data needs to be frequently updated to include recent
customer purchases. Automatic secure data import is necessary to replace the
convoluted process of manual tracking with multiple spreadsheets, a time consuming
delay inducing method for sharing data. Having an automatic secure import resolves
the problem of slow data sharing and enhances information privacy, and this allows
users access to secure vital data when they need it. The WTPS is then configured to
provide display and user generated reports on both customer software maintenance
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
terms and license keys. In this alternative, users would only have to consult one
interface—the WTPS. It was important to users that they be able to easily view and
analyze customer data in one system, which reduces the waiting time or checking of
multiple data repositories. Clearly indicating current contracts and displaying the
license key components (which refers to customer details such as how many users are
entitled on that particular license) is something built into the WTPS. In the system
tests this project reduced the time users spend accessing and validating key customer
data by improving data sharing. Another product of the project is the protection of key
information against human midstream errors by automating data management
processes. The system design rested on some key factors.
Figure 2. Solution Overview
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Systems Design Rationale
Automatic transferring of license key (LK) and software maintenance term (SWMT)
data into the web-based transaction processing system (WTPS) while preserving
customers’ information privacy may solve the manual data transfer problem. The
web-based transaction processing system was chosen because the data needs to be
frequently updated to include recent customer purchases. Automatic data import is
necessary to replace the convoluted process of manual tracking with multiple
spreadsheets, a time consuming delay inducing method for sharing data. Having an
automatic import resolves the problem of slow data sharing, and this allows users
access to vital data when they need it.
The WTPS is configured to provide display and user generated reports on both
customer software maintenance terms and license keys. Further, users would only
have to consult one interface—the WTPS. It was important that users are able to
easily view and analyze customer data in one secure system, which saves them the
time and aggravation of having to wait or check multiple data repositories.
Information privacy must be preserved through secure user account and proper
authority management. Clearly indicating current contracts (SWMT derived
information) and displaying the license key components (which reference customer
details such as how many users are entitled on that particular license) is something the
WTPS needs to handle.
System Architecture
The system architecture incorporates early design decisions that affect all subsequent
software engineering work, directly controlling the ultimate success of the system as
an operational entity (Pressman, 2010). Based on the high-level design described
above, MCG developed the LK data sharing system architecture that depicts
relationships between a license key and the relevant stakeholders (shown in Figure 3).
This relationship mapping is the same for the software maintenance terms (SWMT)
data sharing system.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Figure 3. License Key Related Data Relationships
As elaborated in system requirements 1.0-7.0, the first main function of this system
will be to copy License Keys from the new License DB to WTPS. The system should
integrate the License DB and WTPS in the following ways:



Automate copy of new License Keys (LKs) from the License DB to a custom
License WTPS object.
Update existing LK data in WTPS when there are changes in the License DB.
Use customer EU ID in the Licenses object to associate to Account Number in
the Account object to relate the objects.
The SWMT terms are transferred over to the WTPS using similar relationships except
that rather than having license data fields and objects, there is software maintenances
term data and related objects in the WTPS.
Once the License Key and Software Maintenance Term data is imported to the WTPS
(Figure 4), the information is displayed to WTPS users in simplified lists which the
users can click on if they want to expand (if they want to see full data presentations).
Preparing these systems was an iterative process, but laying out (and documenting) a
clear vision for stakeholder needs was very helpful. Future steps are following up with
their use of the system, and also thinking about other ways they may want to leverage
these systems to move additional data or generate analytical reports.
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Figure 4. License Key Related Structures in the License Database and WTPS Systems
Implementation
Implementation was done in phases. In the first phase, MCG implemented the License
Key functionality. The WTPS objects to store the License Key information were
tested, followed by testing of the License Key database to ensure data accuracy. After
the data email handling for the License Key data integration was checked for
automatic and accurate information transport, the License Key integration solution
went active (live).
In the second phase, MCG implemented the Service Contract (Software Maintenance
Terms) functionality. The WTPS objects to store the software related purchases and
create the associated service contracts were tested in conjunction with test data being
run through a test system. After the integration was checked for automatic and
accurate information transport, the software purchase integration solution went active
(live).
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
Testing and Results
In testing the data integration, the results of the varied tests showed that data was
being accurately transferred to the WTPS. Next, the process of checking was done to
make sure that data was easily manageable inside the WTPS. Various stakeholders
had relationships to this data integration process. For sales, which needed to see up to
date information, a simple view of this data (and some optional descriptions) satisfied
them. For support, MCG created an automatic service contract for active maintenance
contract holders. On this contract (displayed on an electronic customer page), users
can see relevant purchases and can click on them if they want more details. For
administrators, they are able to assign additional accounts and customer support
contacts. Additionally, they are able to edit data though they shouldn’t ever have to.
LESSONS LEARNED
In the design of the solution, several principles and guidelines were developed and
practiced to ensure that information privacy is preserved. First, while most
stakeholders’ concerns were about sharing data, information privacy is always as
important as data sharing. All data attributes and content that have implication on
information privacy were carefully protected. Second, security is built into the design
of all the interfaces of the components, e.g., between the database system and web
interface, between the software license database and other data sources. Encryption
and secure accounts that have different levels of authority are used throughout the
system. Third, all stakeholders, especially the day-to-day users and managers, are
educated on information privacy issues. Training and ongoing reminders are provided
to them. Fourth, documentations of system design and development are stored and
organized so that stakeholders can access and trace the design process and issues. This
requirement can help ensure that information privacy continues to be built into future
versions of the system.
EPILOGUE
IT Director, Carl Silver, was attending a meeting in the office of CFO, Daniel
Morgan.
“How is the MCG team doing on the IT integration project we talked about a while
ago?” Daniel said.
Carl replied, “Great, I’m glad you asked something. Since the License Key data
project went live, I have heard that it has been a great time saver and confidence
booster to have that data automatically available to authorized persons needing current
product licensing information. Now we have the benefits of both data sharing and
information privacy. In fact, I just heard from someone who thinks the secure,
automatic counter of licensed users is just the coolest thing with this available data. As
for the software support information, tech support finds it so useful because they can
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Enhancing Information Privacy and Data Sharing Case
easily see in a secure environment whether a customer has an active contract. I’ve
heard sales persons also like it because they can easily target expiring customers
without having to wait a month for a report. Excuse me, I’ve just been paged. Let’s
talk later.”
“Glad to hear that MCG and your team’s integration worked, we have got a lot more
business we are absorbing. Thanks for stopping by.” Carl replied as he immersed
himself into another stack of documents.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This paper is based upon work supported in part by the National Science Foundation
(through award DUE-1141209) and by the Knowledge Systems Laboratory
(http://ksl.uncfsu.edu/). Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations
expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the
views of NSF. We thank the students and company stakeholders who participated in
this project. We thank the reviewers and editor for their work and valuable comments.
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APPENDIX 1
Abbreviation
CEO
CFO
CRM
DB
Dir.
ERP
EU ID
GP
IAM
IT
LK
MCG
Mgr.
OA
PK
Sr.
SSC
SWMT
VP
WTPS
Full Name
Chief Executive Officer
Chief Financial Officer
Customer Relationship Management
Database
Director
Enterprise Resource Planning
End-User Identification Number
Great Plains – Microsoft Dynamics accounting and financial package
Inside Account Manager
Information Technology
License Key
Mission Consulting Group
Manager
Order Administrator
Primary Key
Senior
Senior Service Coordinator
Software maintenance term
Vice President
Web-based Transaction Processing System
AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY
Wingyan Chung is Associate Professor of MIS in the School of Business and
Economics at UNC Fayetteville State University, where he is also the Founder and
Director of Knowledge Systems Laboratory (http://ksl.uncfsu.edu/). He received his
Ph.D. in MIS from The University of Arizona, and an MS and BBA from The Chinese
University of Hong Kong. Dr. Chung’s scholarly interests and expertise include
business intelligence, data/text/Web mining, knowledge management, security and
health informatics, information visualization, and human-computer interaction.
Lewis Hershey is Professor of Marketing in the School of Business and Economics at
UNC Fayetteville State University. He received his Ph.D. from Louisiana State
University, and MA and BA in Communications from UNC Chapel Hill. Dr.
Hershey’s scholarly interests include marketing, management and leadership,
information-processing and communications theory, narrative and literary criticism,
intercultural communication, and classical rhetoric.
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