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Introduction
Humans communicate with each other in many different ways. The simplest forms of

communication involve talking out loud, using hand signs and writing down messages.

Technology is used to increase the number of ways people can communicate. People

have invented devices and systems that allow individuals to talk to each other when they are

not together. Communications technology is an important part of both todays and

tomorrows society.

Telecommunication plays a vital role in keeping the balance of the renewed

society since it has helped billions of people to keep in touch with each other

although they are a million of miles away, even stresses out overseas. Although

humanity has benefited from the resources and convenience provided by telecommunication

contradicting these are the disadvantages of telecommunication if misused, brutalized and

abused.

Communication ties together the parts of the society just as the nervous system ties

together the parts of an individual. From earliest times, when the only form of communication

was speech, to the present, when electronic signals carry information instantly to practically

any point on Earth, communication has been the way people have organized their

cooperative activities.
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Question 1
Telecommunications involves the assisted transmission of data. Most people think of

electronics when it comes to telecommunications. While it is true that the radio, Internet,

television, and computer networks are all telecommunication devices, there are actually

many other methods of telecommunication. In fact, telecommunication dates back almost to

the advent of civilization. During this time, people used smoke signals, carrier pigeons and

beacons to transmit important data over long distances.1

Currently technologies develop very fast, making it hard for people to keep up with

them. The development of these technologies causes changes in all aspects of life.

Technology has rapidly changed the way people communicate in so many ways. If we

just consider the concept of Communication's Technology and its effects on our society we

can see it has changed the way that we conduct business and has dramatically changed the

way we conduct our social and personal lives. We can now either talk, text, or e-mail, over

an internet link or telephonic connection to anyone nearly anywhere in the world, order a

vast number of items from or do business with, companies on any one of the five

continents. We can visit places (virtually) that we would never have conceived of going too

much less ever seeing them and there are also places we can visit but we can never actually

go to physically. Educational method have changed there are now MOCC's and a vast

number of blended learning courses open to anyone one with a computer or smart phone

and a connection to the internet. That being said though it has also created a myriad of

problems that seem to be increasing as the technology improves. We must be ever more

vigilant with how and who we give our personal information too or even just question our

sources of information for veracity and wonder just what the truth is the list of problems could

be endless all depending on the tack one goes down.2

1http://www.brighthub.com/office/collaboration/articles/61923.aspx
2https://storify.com/RoryP1/some-of-the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-commun
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1.1 These are some of the advantages of telecommunications:

Speed / time money can be saved because its much quicker to move information

around. With the help of ICT it has become quicker and more efficient to contact either a

business or family member. We can now correspond with anyone around the globe by

simply text messaging them, or sending them an email, for an almost instantaneous

response. The wide availability of the internet has also opened up face-to-face direct

communication from nearly anywhere in the world, thanks to the help of video-conferencing,

social networking websites, Skype and a myriad of deals offered by telecommunications

companies and smart phones thus making it far cheaper than in the past. Online

communication can bring families / friends together across distances.

Globalization - Video conferencing saves money on flights and accommodation. ICT

has not only brought the countries and people closer together, but it has allowed the world's

economy to become a single interdependent system. This means that we can not only share

information quickly and efficiently, but we can also bring down barriers of linguistic and

geographic boundaries. The world has developed into a global village due to the help of

information technology, allowing countries like Ireland and China who are not only separated

by distance but also by language to share ideas and information with each other.

Cost effectiveness - It feels free to send an email as compared to phone calls. ICT

has also helped to automate business practises, thus restructuring businesses to make them

exceptionally cost effective. This, in turn, increases productivity making the business more

profitable; that usually means better pay and less strenuous working conditions.

Greater Availability - ICT has made it possible for businesses to be automated

giving clients access to a website or voicemail 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This means

that a business can be open anytime, anywhere, giving a customer the capability to make a

purchase from different countries thus making it easier and more convenient. It also means

that you can have your goods delivered right to your doorstep from places that you would

never have had access to before.

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Bridging the cultural gap Greater access to technology has helped to bridge the

cultural gap by helping people from different cultures to communicate with one another, and

allow for the exchange of views and ideas, thus increasing awareness and reducing

prejudice.

Creation of new jobs - Probably, the best advantage of ICT has been the creation of

new and interesting jobs. Computer programmers, Systems analysts, Hardware and

Software developers, and Web designers are just some of the many new employment

opportunities created with the help of ICT.

Education Computers along with their programs and the Internet have created

educational opportunities not available to previous generations. Information is freely

available to any and all with an internet connection.

1.2 These are some of the disadvantages of telecommunications:

Unemployment - Replace "advances in technology" for "increased productivity" and

the primary change from a labour-intensive to a technology-enabled economy can be

explained. While information technology may have streamlined the business process, it has

also created job redundancies, downsizing, and outsourcing. ICT can make someone more

efficient at their job; a company can therefore employ less people to complete that job. For

example: In a factory, skilled technicians and machinists can be replaced by computer-

controlled robots which can work faster, for longer and more consistently or large companies

who used once employed many typists they can now be replaced by one person using a

word processor.

Privacy - Though information technology may have made communication quicker,

easier, and more convenient, it has also brought along privacy issues. From cell phone

signal interceptions to e-mail hacking, people are now worried about their once private

information becoming public knowledge. An example of this could be the embedding of

microchips n virtually everything you buy, wear, drive and read, allowing retailers and law
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enforcement to track consumer items and, by extension, consumers wherever they go,

from a distance.

Lack of job security Experts in a wide variety of fields believe that ICT has made

job security a big issue, since technology keeps on changing nearly every day. This means

that individuals need to be constantly studying or at least keeping up with changes in their

profession, if they want to feel secure in their jobs to be secure.

Overriding Cultures - While ICT may have made the world a global village, it has

also contributed to one culture consuming another weaker one. For example, it is now

argued that teenagers in the US influence how most young teenagers all over the world now

act, dress, and behave. Languages too have become overshadowed, with English becoming

the primary mode of communication for business and everything else.

Reliance on Technology Professor Ian Robertson, a neuropsychology expert

based at Trinity College Dublin who carried out the study, said: People have more to

remember these days, and they are relying on technology for their memory but the less you

use of your memory, the poorer it becomes. This may be reflected in the survey findings

which show that the over 50s who grew up committing more to memory report better

performance in many areas than those under 30 who are heavily reliant on technology to act

as their day to day aide memoir. For example; people dont bother learning to spell because

they use spell-checker, or need a calculator do perform minor addition or subtraction.

Reliability of Information Anyone with access to a computer and an internet

connection internet can start a blog or post something up on a website, so just because

somethings on the web doesn't mean its reliable. A prime example of this is the open

source of encyclopaedia, Wikipedia, although considered a good source of information it is

not recognized by academic institutions as a trustworthy reference. There is also risks

attached to the unknown / hidden elements on the internet as you dont necessarily know

who you are talking to.

Computer viruses such as worms, Trojans, malware, spam, phishing- any or all can

cause chaos and disrupt our daily lives and privacy.

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Question 2
2.1 Virtual Private Network

A VPN or Virtual Private Network is a network connection that enables you to

create a secure connection over the public Internet to private networks at a remote

location.3 With a VPN, all network traffic (data, voice, and video) goes through a secure

virtual tunnel between the host device (client) and the VPN providers servers, and is

encrypted. VPN technology uses a combination of features such as encryption, tunnelling

protocols, data encapsulation, and certified connections to provide you with a secure

connection to private networks and to protect your identity. VPN connections technically give

you all the benefits of a Local Area Network (LAN), which is similar to that found in many

offices but without requiring a hard-wired connection. Early VPNs were often set up to give

individual employees secure remote access to their company networks, hence the name

virtual private network. By connecting to the companys network, an individual employee

can access all the companys resources and services as if the employee were inside the

company. Since then, VPNs have evolved to provide the same level of secure

communication between any devices on the internet. Today, using VPN is increasingly

popular among consumers as a means to protect their privacy online, secure their browsing

sessions, and get unrestricted access to content or websites that are otherwise blocked or

censored.

How does the VPN works?4 To make use of the VPN, the remote computer (i.e.,

off-campus computers bearing non-corporate-owned IP addresses assigned by the Internet

Service Provider (ISP)) must have the VPN client software installed. When connection to the

corporate network is attempted, the VPN client software will first connect to the VPN server

using a tunnelling protocol (into which other authentication and encryption protocols have

also been incorporated). After the remote computer has been successfully authenticated, a

secure connection (secret tunnel) between it and the VPN server will then be formed as all

subsequent data being exchanged through this tunnel will be encrypted at the sending end

3https://www.hotspotshield.com/learn/what-is-a-vpn/
4http://www.cityu.edu.hk/csc/deptweb/facilities/ctnet/vpn/vpn.htm
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and correspondingly decrypted at the receiving end of the tunnel. As such, the network

tunnel between them, even though established through the un-trusted Internet, is still

considered secure enough that the remote computer can be trusted by local computers on

the corporate LAN. In fact, the remote computer will even be allocated with an IP address

from corporate's IP address space by the VPN server once successfully authenticated so

that other local computers can communicate with it via the VPN server using that IP address.

It is this automatic IP address translation between ISP's IP address and corporate's IP

address offered by the VPN server which makes the remote PC look like a local computer.

The types of VPNs5 are differ by architecture, purpose of usage, and accessibility.

Two basic types of accessibility are site-to-site VPN and remote access VPN.

Figure 1. Site-to-Site VPN and Remote Access VPN connecting to a Corporate Network

Site-to-site VPNs are used in the corporate environment. A site-to-site VPN ensures the

safe encrypted connection of two or more local area networks (LANs) of the same company

or of different companies. It means two geographically separated offices are virtually bridged

together into a single LAN and users can access data throughout this network.

Remote Access VPNs connect an individual computer to a private network. This type of

VPN can be divided again into two groups:

Corporate VPNs Corporate VPNs allow business travellers and telecommuters to

connect to their company networks and remotely access resources and services on

the networks. When a user connects his/her device to the companys VPN, the VPN

thinks that the users computer is on the same local network as the VPN.

5https://www.hotspotshield.com/learn/what-is-a-vpn/
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Personal VPNs Personal VPNs provide consumers with the same private and

secure connection as the corporate VPNs. However, personal VPNs are not used to

connect to private networks to access private resources. Nowadays, consumers use

personal VPN services mainly to browse the web anonymously, secure their web

browsing sessions at public WiFi with HTTPs encryption, and bypass internet

restrictions to get access to blocked websites and internet services (i.e. Skype,

Gmail). Personal VPN services are especially useful when connecting to a public

WiFi network. It is estimated that nearly 90% of public WiFi networks are not

secured. By using a VPN service, all your internet communications will be encrypted,

making it almost impossible for hackers and snoopers to read and steal your private

information. There are many personal VPN service providers available for consumers

to choose from, with many offering VPN services to consumers for free or for a low

monthly subscription fee. These services also make it easy and quick for you to

install and use a VPN on practically any platform, including mobile and tablet

devices.

The uses of VPNs6 are a fairly simple tool, but they can be used to do a wide variety of

things:

Access a Business Network While Travelling: VPNs are frequently used by

business travellers to access their business network, including all its local network

resources, while on the road. The local resources dont have to be exposed directly

to the Internet, which increases security.

6http://www.howtogeek.com/133680/htg-explains-what-is-a-vpn/
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Access Your Home Network While Travelling: You can also set up your own VPN

to access your own network while travelling. This will allow you to access a Windows

Remote Desktop over the Internet, use local file shares, and play games over the

Internet as if you were on the same LAN (local area network).

Hide Your Browsing Activity from Your Local Network and ISP: If youre using a

public Wi-Fi connection, your browsing activity on non-HTTPS websites is visible to

everyone neraby, if they know how to look. If you want to hide your browsing activity

for a bit more privacy, you can connect to a VPN. The local network will only see a

single, secure VPN connection. All the other traffic will travel over the VPN

connection. While this can be used to bypass connection-monitoring by your Internet

service provider, bear in mind that VPN providers may opt to log the traffic on their

ends.

Access Geo-Blocked Websites: Whether youre an American trying to access your

Netflix account while travelling out of the country or you wish you could use American

media sites like Netflix, Pandora, and Hulu, youll be able to access these region-

restricted services if you connect to a VPN located in the USA.

Bypass Internet Censorship: Many Chinese people use VPNs to get around the

Great Firewall of China and gain access to the entire Internet. (However, the Great

Firewall has apparently started interfering with VPNs recently.)

Downloading Files: Yes, lets be honest many people use VPN connections to

download files via BitTorrent. This can actually be useful even if youre downloading

completely legal torrents if your ISP is throttling BitTorrent and making it extremely

slow, you can use BitTorrent on a VPN to get faster speeds. The same is true for

other types of traffic your ISP might interfere with (unless they interfere with VPN

traffic itself.)
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2.2 Virtual Private Network (VPN) differs to other network such as PAN, MAN, WAN?

Personal Area Network (PAN)

PAN stands for personal area network, and again, it's exactly what it sounds

like: a network covering a very small area, usually a small room.7 This could be also

inside a small office or residence. A typical PAN would include one or more computers,

telephones, peripheral devices, video game consoles and other personal entertainment

devices The best known wireless PAN network technology is Bluetooth, and the most

popular wired PAN is USB. It is might be our wireless headset, our printer or our

smartphones as components in a network, but they are definitely talking with each other.

Many peripheral devices are actually computers in their own right. Wi-Fi also serves as a

PAN technology, since Wi-Fi is also used over a small area. If multiple individuals use the

same network within a residence, the network is sometimes referred to as a home area

network, or HAN. In a very typical setup, a residence will have a single wired Internet

connection connected to a modem. This modem then provides both wired and wireless

connections for multiple devices. The network is typically managed from a single computer

but can be accessed from any device. This type of network provides great flexibility. For

example, it allows you to:

Send a document to the printer in the office upstairs while you are sitting on the couch with

your laptop.

Upload the photo from your cell phone to your desktop computer.

Watch movies from an online streaming service to your TV.

Metropolitan Area Network (MAN)

A metropolitan area network (MAN) (not to be confused with "manpages" in the UNIX

and Linux world) connects nodes located in the same metro area. A metropolitan area

network, or MAN, consists of a computer network across an entire city, college

campus or small region.8 A MAN is larger than a Local Area Network (LAN), which is

typically limited to a single building or site. Depending on the configuration, this type of

7 https://www.techopedia.com/2/29090/networks/lanwanman-an-overview-of-network-types
8http://study.com/academy/lesson/types-of-networks-lan-wan-wlan-man-san-pan-epn-vpn.html
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network can cover an area from several miles to tens of miles. A MAN is often used to

connect several LANs together to form a bigger network. When this type of network is

specifically designed for a college campus, it is sometimes referred to as a campus area

network, or CAN. For example, a company located in the San Francisco Bay Area might

have its buildings in San Francisco, Oakland and San Jose linked together via a network.

One of the most common ways for organizations to build this kind of network is to

use microwave transmission technology. You might have seen a microwave antenna on a

TV news van, extended high in the air, beaming video and sound back to the main TV

studio. It's also possible to wire buildings together using fiber-optic cable, but as with WANs,

most organizations that use wires will lease them from another carrier. Laying cable

themselves is quite expensive. In the past, organizations that had a MAN

used asynchronous transfer mode (ATM), FDDI or SMDS networks.

Wide Area Network (WAN)

WAN, in contrast to a LAN, refers to a wide area network. A wide area network,

or WAN, occupies a very large area, such as an entire country or the entire world. A

WAN can contain multiple smaller networks, such as LANs or MANs.9 The Internet is

the best-known example of a public WAN. The name is exactly what it sounds like: a

network that covers an area wider than a LAN. Beyond that, the definition is less clear.

Distances can range from a network connecting multiple buildings on a corporate or college

campus to satellite links connecting offices in different countries.

WANs can be wired, using fibre cable, for example, or wireless. A wireless WAN

might use microwave or infrared (IR) transmission technology, or even satellite. Laying fibre

may make sense when connecting a campus but becomes more expensive when

connecting greater distances. To save money, an organization may opt for wireless

technology or lease lines from a third party.

9http://study.com/academy/lesson/types-of-networks-lan-wan-wlan-man-san-pan-epn-vpn.html
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Virtual Private Network (VPN)

It uses the Internet to allow people to log into a network remotely and access

its resources, but encrypts the connection to thwart eavesdroppers.10 If your company

sets you up with a VPN, you can access your corporate intranet, file servers or email from

home or a coffee shop - just as if you were using it in your office. This makes VPN a popular

way to support remote workers, especially in fields where privacy is paramount, such as

healthcare. Windows, Mac OS X and many Linux distributions can act as VPN clients right

out of the box.

Remote desktop virtualization takes this process even further. The entire desktop

and applications run on a remote server, and are accessed from a client, which can run on a

conventional laptop or even on mobile devices such as tablets or smartphones. This makes

virtual desktops great for supporting BYOD (bring your own device) schemes. If a device is

lost or stolen, the data is safe because it lives on a central server. Citrix and VMware are the

biggest known vendors of virtual desktops.

But what make VPN differs from the other networks? Although VPN uses the

public internet, it can turn the network from public to private network by using

advanced security measures. In the other words, it utilizes internet, a public network,

to simulate a private network that only authorized users can access into the

network.11

10https://www.techopedia.com/2/29090/networks/lanwanman-an-overview-of-network-types
11https://books.google.com.my/books
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Conclusion
It is generally believed that telecommuting is an important new trend in professional

life, because of its many advantages. In short, flexibility in work locations and time, reduction

of travelling costs and time, professional flexibility, reduces the office sixe and the increase

of health seem to be the most important advantages. Though, there are also disadvantages

of telecommuting, isolation and security risks. On this basis, it may be concluded that the

phenomenon telecommuting has some disadvantages alongside of the advantages. While in

this paper it shows only two disadvantages towards five advantages, this does not indicate

that those five advantages weigh heavier than the two disadvantages. I think that an

organization could only have its employees to telecommute while keeping both advantages

and disadvantages in mind, because there are two sides. The employees themselves should

consider both sides as well. Given this, it could be said that for many people it is interesting

to make use of telecommunication. It might be very useful to be able to work during a time

schedule that works best for someone's home situation and also for his or her career.

Whether telecommunicating is good for someone's health is not certain and seems to

depend on each person individually, there are people who cope better with the autonomy

they get in dividing their time in personal and professional moments. Telecommuting seems

to be a good way to combine the extreme busy life people currently tend to have, the

environmental issues everyone wants to improve and . Assuming that the techniques will

improve during the coming years, telecommuting could probably only get easier to apply.

Regarding the advantages and disadvantages, it would probably be hard to choose for a

professional life in which telecommuting would be applied throughout the entire week. I think

that telecommuting is useful, but only if it would be used during one or two days a week, in

order to keep away isolation risks and to make sure that employees keep up with news on

the office floor. Telecommuting is useful for both employees and employers, though too

much use of telecommuting could cause risks.

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References
1. http://www.brighthub.com/office/collaboration/articles/61923.aspx

2. https://storify.com/RoryP1/some-of-the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-commun

3. https://www.hotspotshield.com/learn/what-is-a-vpn/

4. http://www.cityu.edu.hk/csc/deptweb/facilities/ctnet/vpn/vpn.htm

5. http://www.howtogeek.com/133680/htg-explains-what-is-a-vpn/

6. https://www.techopedia.com/2/29090/networks/lanwanman-an-overview-of-network-types

7. http://study.com/academy/lesson/types-of-networks-lan-wan-wlan-man-san-pan-epn-

vpn.html

8. https://books.google.com.my/books