Morrisons: Information Technology, Business Impact, and Ethics

This report provides a comprehensive analysis of Information Technology (IT) within the context of Morrisons, a leading UK supermarket chain. It begins with an introduction defining IT and its role in business operations, followed by a literature review covering computer classifications (supercomputers, mainframe, minicomputers, and microcomputers) and their purposes, the impact of IT on businesses (cloud computing, automation, remote work, customer satisfaction, resource management, and open-source software), and the ethical and social issues related to IT (privacy, access rights, patents, copyright, communication breakdown, identity theft). The analysis then applies these concepts to Morrisons, examining the types of computers used, the advantages and challenges of IT implementation, ethical considerations, and the use of the internet and intranet. The report concludes by summarizing the key findings and providing a list of references.

Introduction to
Information
Technology

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
LITERATURE REVIEW................................................................................................................2
Classification of computers....................................................................................................2
Impact of information technology on business......................................................................3
Ethics and social issues of information technology on business............................................4
Growth and importance of internet and intranet.....................................................................4
ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION...................................................................................................6
Different types of computers that are being used in Morrisons.............................................6
Impact of information technology with advantages and challenges on Morrisons................6
Ethics and social issues of information technology in Morrisons..........................................7
Internet and intranet in Morrisons..........................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................9

INTRODUCTION
Information technology can be defined as the summation of techniques and skills along with
the methods and processes which is used in the operations of goods and services in order to
achieve the goals and targets of the business. It is a use of computer system in order to store and
retrieve data which is basically used in the management of the business and is considered as the
path of information and communication Technology. The organisation chosen here is the
Morrisons which is one of the leading international supermarket company based in UK in in
1899. It offers products and services like shopping groceries and online shopping as well. The
following discussion is based on the classification of computers and impact of information
Technology on business along with the ethics and social issues of information Technology on
business and growth and importance of internet and intranet. In context of Morrisons, different
types of computers that are being used in the company, impact of information Technology with
advantages and challenges on company, ethics and social issues of information Technology and
internet and intranet used in the company with proper findings and conclusion.
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LITERATURE REVIEW
Classification of computers
There are basically three classification of computers according to the size, type and
purpose. On the basis of size and capacity, there are four types of computers such as
supercomputer which is used in the research and study of scientific investigations along with the
climate research and laboratories for example IBM road burner, IBM blue gene, Intel red,
PARAM 1000 and cray AMP 14. Another is the mainframe computer which is used in the the
commercial organisations as banks and companies along with the research centres as well
because that task is to support the organisations in keeping the details of payments and
advertising along with the sending bills and notices and many more. For example, IBM ES 000
series, ICL 39 series and CDC 6600. Minicomputer is good for the real time applications such as
in the industries and bookings also with the banks as well for preparing the payroll of the
employees and financial accountants also for the higher education and engineering. For example,
PDP 11 and IBM 8000 series (Burstein, Morales and Vogel, 2019). Micro computer is mainly
used for the personnel working such as in the office or in the personal office along with the
business and data collection and many more. It helps in creating bills and word processing in the
large companies. For example, desktops, tablets, smartphones and laptops. On the basis of
purpose there are general purpose computers which supports in the financial analysis and
document preparation along with the calculations and creating data bases with consistency and
accuracy. their size and storage along with the cost of the computers are less as compared to
other computers and their ability to perform the task is limited but it is versatile and useful for
supporting the basic needs of the people at their home or in the workplace. Special purpose
computers are specialised in the task which are specific in nature and they require specific
processes and input devices in order to work efficiently and moreover its size and capacity along
with the cost is dependent on the nature and size of the work it is performing. For example,
automatic teller machine, washing machines, surveillance equipment, weather forecasting
simulators, traffic control computers, defence oriented applications, oil exploration systems and
military planes controlling computers. On the basis of hardware design and data handling there
are analogue computers which are used in the fields of Technology and science in the area of
voltage and pressure. For example, a simple clock, vehicles speedometer and voltmeter. Digital
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computer has a task to process the computers letters and numerical values or any other special
symbols such as addition and subtraction along with the multiplication and many other
mathematical operations. For example, personal desktop computers, calculators, accounting
machines and many more. Hybrid computers perform the task to solve the calculations and
problems which are complicated in nature and provides the accuracy in the science and
Technology inventions. For example, auto gas online pump and many more. It is the mixture of
both analogue and digital computers (Potok, Schuman, Young and Chakma, 2018).
Impact of information technology on business
There are various impacts of information Technology on business such as the major one is
the cloud computing which has supported the business in storing their large amount of data or
big data online with the help of Internet and networking so that it can be saved from outer world
and can maintain their privacy and confidentiality so that it can be used anytime anywhere only
with the people who are authorised with data which security (Ciampi, Demi, Magrini and Papa,
2021). Automation of business process is another impact which means that earlier every work in
the business is done manually with the human efforts but now with the advancement in the
technology, automation in operations are introduced so that the human efforts could be reduced
along with the time and cost as well. Working remotely is also an impact on the business which
means that with the help of technology people can engage from anywhere in the world and
anytime in order to interact with each other either for the professional purposes or for the
personal purposes as well. Providing customer satisfaction is also the impact which means that
convenience in the business is introduced with the help of technology and the operations are
efficient which item a tree provides the customer satisfaction towards the company and loyalty as
well. management of resources is also the impact which means that there are different
information systems which are used to manage different resources in the companies such as
human resource and marketing along with the research and development and production and
many more. Open source software is also the impact on the business of Technology which means
that there are different software’s available online on the internet so that any business can use it
and modify it as per their needs and requirements in order to improve their business operations
and Management (Soto-Acosta, Popa and Martinez-Conesa, 2018).
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Ethics and social issues of information technology on business
There are different ethical and social issues which are associated with the information
technology and are faced by the business such as ethical issues involve the personal privacy
which is important for every organisation because it is considered as the important data which is
confidential and required to be secured (Spiegel, 2018). Access right is the another ethical issue
which is important to put on a person who are restricted to access data. Then there are patents,
copyright, trade secrets, liability and piracy which are important for any organisation to impose
on their technical assets of the organisation which contains the important facts and figures so that
they can be saved from breaching them out. But the issue is that they need to tell all their systems
information to the people who are responsible for providing them all these ethics so that they can
impose on the organisation which is risky to inform any other person about the in a system of the
organisation (Ienca, Ferretti, Hurst and Vayena, 2018). Social issues include the communication
breakdown, identity theft, cyber bullying, game addiction and many more which are responsible
for the social issue in an organisation because they are related with the cybercrime and the
hackers who misuse their technical knowledge to hack the system and retrieve the important and
private information in order to blackmail the company in terms of money or any other motive.
All such ethical and social issues can be managed if the company invest in the training and
development session for the employees so that they can use the technical equipment in the
company in a restricted manner so that they cannot be a victim of cybercrime. Moreover, the
company must also maintain its password management, authentication and authorisation,
encryption and decryption, two factor authentication and many other cyber securities can be
installed by the company as per their needs and requirements of the technical systems (Blok,
2019).
Growth and importance of internet and intranet
Internet is defined as the global system of different interconnected computer networks. It
mainly uses the internet protocol for its working and every computer is recognised by the unique
IP address. IP address is defined as the unique set of numbers which recognises the computer
location. Domain name server renders the name to the IP address in order to locate a computer
by name. Accessibility of the internet to every user is all over the world. Intranet can be defined
as the system in which the more than one personal computers are interconnected to each other.
personal computers which uses the internet and not at all available to the outside world.
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Generally, every organisation has its own intranet network and employees of the company has
the accessibility to the computers in their intranet. Moreover, every computer in intranet is
recognised by an IP address that is the unique among the computers in that intranet. There are
some similarities between internet and intranet such as both uses the TCP and FTP protocol.
Both has the accessibility with the web browser and different websites. Both can use instant
messengers to receive and send the personal or formal messages. Differences between the two is
that internet is common to personal computers all over the world but intranet is specific to some
of the personal computers (Cunningham, 2018). Internet renders the better and wider access to
the websites but intranet is restricted network. Internet it is not save in terms of Private data but
intranet is saved because it is restricted and it can be safely privatized as per the requirement.
Importance of Internet in the business is that it helps the business in performing the marketing
and advertising function the most effective and efficient manner which supports the company in
saving their time and cost along with the energy and human efforts. there are many options
available for online marketing such as social media marketing and search engine optimisation
along with the Google ads and pay per click. It also helps in the business to do product survey
and testing because manually serving by interacting each and every customer in the market can
be very difficult therefore it can be easy for the business to perform online surveys with the help
of Internet and can gather the information from the customers for their products and services and
market research. Moreover, internet provides the platform to the business to sell their products
and services online such as now a day there are various websites available who are working
electronically and sell their products and services in an online manner with the online payment as
well which provides the convenience not only the company but also to the customers as well
because they also provide the delivery services at home and customers prefer such services that
gives convenience them. Internet provides the business in the execution of employee training and
development programs because there is different software available for the employee
Management which renders the training sessions to the employees for better growth and
development of the career and in the professionalism as well which helps in the employee
satisfaction, employee retention, reducing employee absenteeism and turnover. Internet also
supports the business in maintaining the long-term relationships with the customers along with
their loyalty towards the brand by interacting with the customers immediately and giving them
feedback in an instant manner with the help of internet. Moreover, internet speed helps business
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in making its process and operations accurately. Importance of intranet in the business is that it
helps in the better internal communications in terms of memos and staff news or any
announcements. It supports in maintaining the privacy of the information that it should not be
leaked out of the organisation. Sharing of resources and best practices is the benefit of intranet
because the resources such as the printers and other hardware and software devices are easily
shared with the help of intranet with an appropriate safety and security of the resources and
improvement in the customer servicing because there is the enhancement in the interaction level
and management of the organisation after implementation of the intranet in the company.
Moreover, it also supports in the business functioning such as publishing and document
management along with the training sessions and workflow of the company in order to manage
front end corporate systems and emails (Javed, Yasir, Ali and Majid, 2020).
ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION
Different types of computers that are being used in Morrisons
Morrisons is a large organisation with different branches and expanded all over the world
and operates its business globally. Types of computers used by the more reasons large in number
because their level of operations and Management is high and they are required to manage not
only the business functioning but also the employees as well therefore they are acquiring the
variety of computing systems to manage their operations (Maxwell, Warner and Fang, 2018).
They use supercomputer for the functioning of research and development of new technology so
that they can provide the advanced services to the customers for better loyalty. They also use the
microcomputer so that they can be mobile everywhere and can engage their stakeholders
anywhere and anytime with good efficiency and effectiveness. They also use the special purpose
computers for their specific operations in the company such as human resource and finance along
with the marketing and many more. Moreover, they also use the hybrid computers which is a
mixture of analogue and digital computers for better updates and upgrades in their digitalization
and using such technology in their company so that they can introduce advancement in
supermarket industry (Lotte, Bougrain, Cichocki and Yger, 2018).
Impact of information technology with advantages and challenges on Morrisons
Morrisons has faced both the advantages and challenges of implementation of information
technology in the organisation. Advantages to the company such as they are benefited with the
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automation in terms of productivity enhancement. they have improved the communication and
collaboration with their internal and external stakeholders. They are happy with their reliable
storage of data and inventory systems by using the information technology in an efficient manner
(Ashrafi, Ravasan, Trkman and Afshari, 2019). Moreover, they are benefited with the
information protection and financial savings. Morrisons technical team has a good knowledge
about technology and therefore they support the company that how they can choose the
technology for the benefit of the company as per the needs and requirements. Challenges faced
by the company such as the information security is the major challenge which includes the data
privacy and storage along with its management because there are different hackers available in
the market which misuses their information technology knowledge in order to blackmail and
steal the money from the company. Cloud computing and social media are also the challenges
along with the risk management and governance of it. Company is also facing with the
regulatory compliance in terms of Technology integration and upgradation of resource
management and infrastructure management. It takes a lot of cost in monitoring the fraud and
business continuity in terms of disaster recovery (Buck and Eder, 2018).
Ethics and social issues of information technology in Morrisons
There are different ethical issues of information technology which are faced by the
Morrisons such as the patents and trade secrets because there are different software which are
developed by the company in order to make their operations comfortable in management so that
they can maintain efficiency and effectiveness in their business functioning but the issue is that
patents and trade secrets want the inside information of the software which are required for the
legal formalities and this can prove risky for the Morrisons to disclose their software information
to the people who are handling patents and trade secrets operations because this information is
confidential and private in in an organisation and it cannot be disclosed to anyone. There are
social issues as well of information Technology which is faced by more raisins such as cyber
bullying which means that insecure protection of data and a risk of breaching of information
(Huda, 2019).
Internet and intranet in Morrisons
Internet use by the Morrison by implementing the different types of networks such as local
area network which is restricted to one building, metropolitan area Network which connects
different buildings networking and wide area network which connects different countries or
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States with the help of networking and internet. Intranet is used by the Morrison so that they can
maintain the privacy and security of the resources and the information which is shared among the
employees of the organisation and it can be restricted among the people who have the
authorization to access it. Which means it cannot go out of the Intranet coverage area. Internet
and intranet has given different benefits to the Morrison in terms of increasing the productivity
and efficiency of the company along with the management and operations of business
functioning (Vinitha, Renuka and Bharathi, 2018).
CONCLUSION
It is concluded that information technology is an important concept to study and learn so that
its application can be applied in the real world organisations for better effectiveness and
efficiency in the working and operations of the company. Nowadays the technology is advancing
in a very great place and it is impossible to survive for the business without Technology.
Therefore, it is important to analyse the classification of computers, it is essential to examine the
impact of information Technology on business, it is necessary to determine the ethics and social
issues of information Technology on business and it is significance to gain the knowledge about
growth and importance of internet and intranet. along with this basic knowledge it is crucial and
imperative to learn these areas in context of the organisation so that better analysis and
discussion can be done with the practical implementation of the information technology and can
have the insight knowledge about the advancement in technology in context of the company.
hence this report covers all such areas in order to better understand the conception of information
technology in business.
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REFERENCES
Books and journal
Ashrafi, A., Ravasan, A.Z., Trkman, P. and Afshari, S., 2019. The role of business analytics
capabilities in bolstering firms’ agility and performance. International Journal of
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Blok, V., 2019. From participation to interruption: toward an ethics of stakeholder engagement,
participation and partnership in corporate social responsibility and responsible
innovation. In International Handbook on Responsible Innovation. Edward Elgar
Publishing.
Buck, C. and Eder, D., 2018. The Impact of Digitization on Business Models-A Systematic
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Burstein, A., Morales, E. and Vogel, J., 2019. Changes in between-group inequality: computers,
occupations, and international trade. American Economic Journal:
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capabilities on business model innovation: The mediating role of entrepreneurial
orientation. Journal of Business Research, 123, pp.1-13.
Cunningham, P., 2018. Drivers of Performance of Privately Owned, Rapid-Growth Firms: A
Reconceptualization of the Trust–Commitment Model of Relationship Marketing.
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Huda, M., 2019. Empowering application strategy in the technology adoption: insights from
professional and ethical engagement. Journal of Science and Technology Policy
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Ienca, M., Ferretti, A., Hurst, S. and Vayena, E., 2018. Considerations for ethics review of big
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creation and the rise of electronic social enterprise. World Journal of Entrepreneurship,
Management and Sustainable Development.
Lotte, F., Bougrain, L., Cichocki, A. and Yger, F., 2018. A review of classification algorithms
for EEG-based brain–computer interfaces: a 10 year update. Journal of neural
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Maxwell, A.E., Warner, T.A. and Fang, F., 2018. Implementation of machine-learning
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Potok, T.E., Schuman, C., Young, S. and Chakma, G., 2018. A study of complex deep learning
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Soto-Acosta, P., Popa, S. and Martinez-Conesa, I., 2018. Information technology, knowledge
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Spiegel, J.S., 2018. The ethics of virtual reality technology: social hazards and public policy
recommendations. Science and engineering ethics. 24(5). pp.1537-1550.
Vinitha, V., Renuka, D.K. and Bharathi, A., 2018. E-mail spam classification using machine
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