July 2024 - RSI Concepts - Top IT Solution Provider Company in Dubai, UAE

Businesses tend to rely on various software-based solutions and digital technologies in order to achieve higher operational efficiency and performance. The custom software development is a method to tailor-made software solutions as per business’s unique and exclusive needs. Businesses can also invest in custom software development to level up their defense against the increasing cyber threats and growing security concerns. The cyber security has become the biggest concern for present day businesses and customers alike. The custom software development enable businesses to incorporate various innovative and personalized features to align the app with their needs. Similarly businesses can also incorporate advanced security measures and protective features to elevate the security of their software application.

The custom software development offers more flexibility and control in designing and development process which enable businesses to incorporate a range of security features throughout the development process. This help businesses to deal with increasingly sophisticated and ever evolving security threats. The cyber security is crucial to protect digital assets as well as any business’s reputation. If a small data breach occurs which compromises even least important internal data, even this could have done staggering damage to the business’s reputation. Because the customers will instantly loose trust if they find their favorite brand got data-breach. In this blog we will discuss how custom software development helps elevating the security and strengthen businesses against cyber threats.

Developing Secure Custom Software in a Cyber Threat Landscape

Understanding the Cyber Threats Businesses are Facing Regularly

The cyber threats businesses had to deal with are evolving, from phishing, to DDoS attacks, malwares, SQL Injection and highly sophisticated ransomware, these all are a few of most common threats. With the passage of time the techniques and tools used to perform such attacks have become highly sophisticated and advanced. Moreover there are cyber-attacks related to IoTs and in some cases there are insider attacks. The insider attacks are mostly unintentional where an employee or contractor who have access to sensitive data got attacked. Whatever the case is the cyber threats are increasing greatly and becoming more challenging day by day. Apart from these there are several other cyber threats that businesses need to handle such as cross-site scripting, identity-based attacks, and much more.

For example, where the cloud is transforming digital landscape, the security challenges are paramount due to distributed ownership, authority and various other aspects. All these threats are increasing the chances of getting compromised. Furthermore as the AI is rapidly progressing and infusing into almost every digital technology it could. The malicious actors are also seem to exploiting the AI to enhance their attacks. In such situations the custom software development can provide an extra layer of security due to its flexible approach towards structure, technology platforms and control over each and every aspects of the software development and operation. The custom software development also enable businesses to utilize proven coding practices, frameworks, platforms and software stacks to boost security.

Understanding the Cyber Threats Businesses are Facing Regularly

How Custom Software Development Help Boosting the Security of Digital Assets

The custom software development empower businesses in building software solution from ground up, where this enable businesses to incorporate innovative features, it also help building better security features. The bespoke approach always offer better flexibility and control which enable the developers to introduce more security features and build multiple layers of security to deal with the exclusive and unique challenges and vulnerabilities. Here are some key aspects of custom software development which help enhancing and improving the security of the applications:

Custom Software Development: Secure Coding

The secure coding doesn’t represent a framework or tool but in fact it is a practice and technique which complies the programmer’s decisions while creating source code and building the software applications. Although the secure coding techniques ensures that the programmer or coder minimize the possibilities of having vulnerabilities in the software program. As industry standard or best practices you can effectively implement the OWASP Secure Coding Standards or SEI CERT Coding Standards within your custom software development project. Secure coding doesn’t mean using specialized programming languages, for example, the secure coding mandates “default deny” permission approach, and it means all the permissions are denied until specified otherwise.

Here are a few crucial areas to consider and understand for secure coding:

Security by Design: The security by design refers to the two areas, one the security is the top priority during the entire software development life cycle. Second it refers to prioritizing the security over the design aspects. For example, the CSS and JS needed to be secured in case of web-based software application.
Strong Passwords: The password and login credentials are the most common area users got exploited. Therefore including two factor authentication and adopting encrypted password storing methods could greatly enhance the security. Implementing strong and long password with enabling protection on wrong attempts and two factor are essential for present day software.
Access Control: Often the developers doesn’t realize but the access control can significantly elevate or compromise the security of your software application. It is a standard to have implemented the “default deny” approach which means all the permissions will be denied until granted. This could make data protected and access to it difficult for the malicious actors.
Error Logging: The error logging and error handling are the two most effective practices to improve the software security. The errors refer to the bugs in the system and the bugs result in vulnerabilities. Hence closely monitoring the bugs, error logs and managing the errors could lead to great improvements in software and strengthening its security.
Environment Configurations: If your custom software is managed in multiple environment such as production and development or staging environment. It is crucial to align both and always keep both up-to-date. The software, frameworks, operating systems, services, and everything should be up-to-date and all the patches should be applied to date.
Threat Modeling: Threat modeling is a multi-stage process involving various techniques, tools and mainly the deeper analysis of the software. The objective of threat modeling is to identify the areas or aspect of your custom software which are more susceptible to exploitation. This will help you upgrading the software and enabling highest security measures within your application.
I/O Validation: The input/output validation is crucial for every custom software application. It is crucial to deploy encoding methods at the outputs and strict validations at the inputs throughout the custom software development lifecycle. The inputs and outputs are the two crucial areas hence need to be secure and well protected.

The secure coding practices are essential to elevate the security of your customized software applications. The software development team has to choose the right platforms, software stacks and above all the mindset to prioritize the security throughout the entire software development lifecycle.

Custom Software Development: Secure Coding

Custom Software Development: Strong Data Encryption

The data encryption is something that has become almost essential in present day. It is crucial to utilize encryption algorithms at various levels. This helps ensuring strong encryption at both stages, data in transit and data at rest. The data in transit means the data in transmitted into server and user interface/device and the data at rest means the data that is being stored at the server or at the user device. Furthermore the end-to-end encryption is also widely used in modern software development, it ensures the data/information transmitted between two terminals, devices or server and client is encrypted and only the recipient has the decryption key.

The encryption is implemented by a very sophisticated encryption algorithms and mathematical operations which generates a random encryption key and that key is so complex that it could take trillions of years for a classical computer to test all the combination to unlock it without having the right encryption key. Therefore the encryption can provide a great protection against even some advanced level cyber-attacks. There are several encryption methods and strategies which can be implemented during the custom software development lifecycle.

Custom Software Development: Strong Data Encryption

Custom Software Development: Third-Party Tools and Resources

It is a common practice in the custom software development to use the third-party tools, resources, libraries and elements to expedite the development process. However, where this speed up everything it also increase the vulnerabilities. Using third-party tools, resources, libraries and other design elements could compromise the security of your customized software application. Most of the time developers tend to find free resources online at various forums and website – which often are posted by other developers and are not properly optimized for security. This is why using such resources, libraries and tools could make your application vulnerable for cross-site scripting, malware attach, SQL injection, etc.

It is always important to carefully inspect the third-party components, codes, resources and elements. Moreover it is crucial to carefully consider the front-end and back-end related tools to ensure perfect alignment and no loophole. Both the design and algorithms should be carefully inspected before using them and after integrating them a critical review/testing should be done with security in mind. Furthermore it is important to understand the vendor of these components to ensure regular upgrades, patches and protection support by the vendor.

Custom Software Development: Third-Party Tools and Resources

Custom Software Development: Insider Threats

The insider threats are always a concern for any enterprise. Most of the times it is not attentional, sometime employees, contractors or the people who have access to the software get attacked by cyber criminals and resultantly enable them access to the sensitive data of the organization. Traditionally the employees or contractor who have access to the system either access it outside of the organizational network or either their computer got attacked by malware. These malwares can silently stay on a computer quietly transmitting data to their source from a hidden backdoor. When the cyber-criminal acquire enough information they try to access the organization’s data.

Businesses often focus on outsider cyber-threats while undermining the importance of insider threats. With the custom software development you can build various checks and controls to prevent or effectively minimize the insider threats. You can also customize your software application to further reduce the impact of an insider attack, whether attentional or unintentional. You can have multi-factor authentication, personalized profiles with limited access to data and much more. The custom software development offer more space to minimize and handle the insider threats.

Custom Software Development: Insider Threats

Conclusion

As the internet and digital solutions are integrating within modern day business landscape the need of security and number of cyber-attacks is rising. Businesses of all industries, sizes and types are in a constant pressure of dealing with the cyber-security. These day’s businesses are heavily relying on digital solutions and software application in order to effectively run their daily operations. These software solutions where boosting efficiency and productivity are also causing various security threats. These software applications are evolving day by day, the cloud computing, IoTs, AI (artificial intelligence) and ML (machine learning), and integrated information infrastructure have completely revolutionized the software solutions.

Where these software solutions are becoming more advanced and impactful the cyber-attacks are also evolving and becoming much more sophisticated and impactful. The cyber-criminals are utilizing cutting-edge technologies and state-of-the-art tools to exploit the vulnerabilities for their malicious intent. We have witnessed some large-scale world-wide cyber-attacks involving malware, ransomware, and other sophisticated attacks. This poses a serious threat as any such data breach could potentially ruin a business’s reputation and brad image. Therefore businesses are now taking interest in custom software development which provides more control and flexibility at the software development cycle and enable businesses to incorporate highly advanced security features.

The custom software development lifecycle enable businesses to adopt secure coding practices which involves prioritizing the security from the very first step up-till the end of the development lifecycle. The custom software development allow businesses to implement strict password policies, implement multi-factor logins and secure authentication. Furthermore the custom software development allow the developers to take necessary measures and build features which not only help preventing the data-breach but also help them to contain and minimize the impact and effect of the any such data-breaches.

In this blog we have discussed briefly about the cyber-threats a business is facing on daily-bases and we have also discussed how the custom software development can help businesses to make their software and application more secure and well-equipped to deal with present day cyber-threats. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to build a highly secure and effective customized software application for your business or organization, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

We all are accustomed to queues, whether we are at a bank, at a bus station, or at an airport, the waiting lines are common. However, for service sector the customer waiting lines and customer flow management is one of the biggest challenge. Think of waiting in a poorly organized queue, you are not sure of how much more time you have to wait. There are people who are jumping the lines, which makes you more anxious. Suddenly you notice the next queue is moving fast, which further frustrate you. Even in some cases you end up waiting in wrong lines, and have to go back to the correct line. All these are common issues with traditional manual queuing practices.

Therefore businesses tend to deploy modern digital queue management systems. The modern queue management systems usually use interactive self-service kiosks for ticket dispensing and customer registration. However, businesses usually doesn’t leverage the full potential of an interactive self-service kiosk. Mostly businesses use interactive self-service kiosk to welcome and greet customers. Typically these kiosk allow customer to choose the right service they need and that is it. The queue management system analyze the customer choice and print a ticket accordingly. This also help queue management system to automatically route customers to the right service counter.

However, an interactive self-service kiosk can do much more, in this blog we will discuss how a self-service kiosk can boost the performance and impact of your digital queue management system. Furthermore these interactive self-service kiosks are very flexible with customization, which makes them ideal companion for bespoke queue management systems.

Self-Service Kiosks for Effective Queue Management

The Evolution of Interactive Self-Service Kiosks

The interactive self-service kiosks have started as humble vending machines. However, with the passage of time these machines started improving. The real evolution kick started with the advancements in the touchscreen technology. Later on various multination manufacturers have started investing in R&D which gives rise to various specialized peripherals and internet connectivity. This have completely transformed the interactive self-service kiosk industry. Now a days if you are living in Dubai, Sharjah, Abu Dhabi or any other region of UAE, you would be familiar with these interactive terminals. Whether it is for mobile top ups utility bill payments, or smart airport check-ins these interactive self-service kiosks are popping up everywhere.

The primary reason of wider adoptability of interactive self-service kiosks is their ability to deliver unmatched customer experience. The customers also enjoy the convenience, control and easy access offered by interactive self-service kiosks. Furthermore with the rise of IT and communication technologies, smartphones and social media, everyone has become more familiar with technology. Businesses have started investing more resources in digital technologies and digital customer experience management. The interactive self-service kiosks can offer multitude of features such as:

Customer Identification – Bio Metrics Scanning, Emirates ID Card Scanning, Facial Recognition, etc.
Customer Registration – Data Input, Document Scanning, Passport Scanning, Barcode/QR Code Scanning, RFID, etc.
Payments – Cash Deposit, Change Return and Cash Recycler, Coin Acceptor, Credit/Debit Card, POS, Online Payment Gateways, Contactless Payments, Digital Payments, etc.
Multi-Lingual Intuitive UIs – The self-service kiosk UIs can support any language regional or international which enhance customer experience
Printing & Scanning – Apart from Ticket printing, interactive self-service kiosks can print and scan QR Codes/Barcodes, Receipts, Vouchers, Documents, Stickers, and even identity cards
Security and Authentication – The interactive self-service kiosk can utilize OTP SMS, Email-based verification, Facial Recognition, Biometrics and several other ways for secure and instant authentication and identification

These all features enable an interactive self-service kiosk to quickly identify a customer and collect as much data as needed. A typical sing-in using Emirates ID, Biometrics or Facial recognition can take less than a minute from greeting customer to dispensing their ticket number for the queue. This is what makes them more effective and efficient. When the customer arrives at the service counter, their details and other information relevant to their query are already made available for the service agent. Such innovative features help boosting the performance and impact of a digital queue management system.

The Evolution of Interactive Self-Service Kiosks

How Interactive Self-Service Kiosk Makes Queue Management More Effective?

The interactive self-service kiosks are widely used with modern day’s digital queue management systems. A queue management system is a tool businesses utilize to streamline customer flow. It is a combination of software and hardware exclusively designed to implement the queuing policies. This provides businesses great advantage in managing visitors. The customers and visitors sign-in to a queue management system via interactive self-service kiosk. The kiosk allow them to choose the service they need, which help the system to direct them to the right service counter. The interactive self-service kiosks has become a standard in modern queue management systems. It is due to their ability to offer multiple features which further enhance the efficiency of the queue management system.

Personalized Customer Experience

When a digital queue management system is equipped with an interactive self-service kiosk, businesses can collect valuable information. This information could range from simple language and service selection to a full-fledged customer registration process. The interactive self-service kiosks comes with touch screen interfaces. These intuitive UIs (user interfaces) are designed to simplify the customer journey. Customer can choose the language of their choice. Further they can choose the service from service list, which allow the queue management system to put them in right waiting line. This prevents any confusion or mistake which are common in manual queuing methods.

Businesses can also integrate various identification methods, such as Emirates ID scanner, passport scanner, RFID, Biometrics, etc. This allow them to quickly collect valuable data. Furthermore the queue management system can also relate the customer with the customer database and fetch all the available details. This ability enable businesses to identify the customer persona, and help them deliver a personalized experience at service counters. The interactive self-service kiosk management software provides service agent dashboards which help agents in various tasks. Furthermore these kiosks can be integrated with other system, pushing relevant information beforehand to the service counter, enabling quicker service delivery. These features greatly enhance customer experience and make queuing more effective and efficient.

Reduction in Customer Wait Time

The primary objective of a queue management system is to streamline customer flow, enhance customer experience and reduce customer wait time. The customer wait time is one of the biggest reason of poor customer experience. As the interactive self-service kiosks has ability to understand customer needs by allowing them to select the relevant service. They can also prevent common human errors by effectively eliminating confusion from the system. The customers can directed to their relevant service counter, they are assured the just treatment and they get the highly accurate estimation of their time to service. All these features help reducing the frustration and improve customer experience. In a government service sector or a multi-channel service environment these interactive self-service kiosks are even more effective.

An interactive self-service kiosk can take as much information as needed to expedite the service delivery process. The customers can scan their documents, or input their data via interactive touch screens. The kiosk management system help customers achieving their tasks with easy-to-understand on-screen prompts and guides. The customers can scan QR Codes, Barcodes, payment slips, etc. which greatly improve the service delivery mechanisms and reduce per service delivery time. Because all these information are relayed directly to the customer service counters, which greatly help service agents. It speed up the service delivery and help reducing the wait time collectively for everyone. This also help enhancing the performance and productivity of the service staff, as they can focus more on their primary tasks. Furthermore the interactive self-service kiosks can share the work burden by automating data collection and by enabling customer to input their data by themselves. These features can greatly reduce the customer wait time and help improving the entire queuing process.

Digital and Cash Payments

One of the biggest advantage of interactive self-service kiosk is its ability to collect payments. There are several businesses who require customers to make payments or pay for their remaining dues. Whatever the case is an interactive self-service payment kiosk can greatly improve the queuing process. They customers who are opting for the queuing token can also make payments at the same self-service kiosk. Above all the interactive self-service kiosk can instantly update all the relevant systems and databases which means the payment will instantly reflect at the service agent’s dashboard. This expedite the service delivery process and also prevent customers from getting into the hustle of making payments through a different channel.

Similarly the self-checkout kiosks are also interactive self-service payment kiosks. In a typical retail environment we all experience long queue, especially at the weekends and during the peak hours. However, the number of cash counters or service counters are limited. This is where an interactive self-service payment kiosk can be deployed as an alternate service channel. These kiosks are specialized as per business needs and are equipped with necessary devices or peripherals which enable a self-service checkout. Whether it is scanning the items, scanning their RFID tags, or acquiring product information, all can be provided through these specialized interactive self-service payment kiosks.

With an alternate service channel in place, the footfall at traditional counters can be reduced. This help reducing the wait time of all customers while significantly improving the queue management system.

Conclusion

The interactive self-service kiosks have completely revolutionized the traditional queue management systems. The modern digital queue management system vastly rely on these kiosks for customer sign-in and ticket dispensing. However, an interactive self-service kiosk’s abilities are not limited to ticket dispensing. In fact it is a technology marvel offering a wide spectrum of innovative and intuitive features which resultantly boost the queuing performance. These interactive self-service kiosks offers various features such as Emirates ID and passport scanning, RFID, intuitive touch screen UIs, payment options and much more. All these features are designed to automate various workflows and processes which effectively reduce the service delivery time. Once the service delivery time is optimized it will impact on the wait time or all customers, effectively reducing it.

One of the biggest advantage of interactive self-service kiosks is their ability to customize according to the business needs. This makes them ideal for literally any industry, whether you are a banks, hospital, university, government agency or an airport, you can customize these kiosk as per your exclusive needs. An interactive self-service kiosk not only boost queue management system but it has ability to collect valuable analytical data based upon user’s interaction. This data further help businesses to analyze their policies, workflows and customer journey, which resultantly help improving the queuing process and customer experience in the long term.

In this blog we have discussed how an interactive self-service kiosk can effectively boost the performance and impact of a queue management system. If you want to learn more about the subject or if you want our help to build a bespoke interactive self-service kiosk and queue management system for your organization, please feel free to contact us through our Contact Us page or leave a comment in the comment box below and we will get in touch with you soon.

BLOG OF RSI CONCEPTS

Month: July 2024

Developing Secure Custom Software in a Cyber Threat Landscape

Understanding the Cyber Threats Businesses are Facing Regularly

How Custom Software Development Help Boosting the Security of Digital Assets

Custom Software Development: Secure Coding

Custom Software Development: Strong Data Encryption

Custom Software Development: Third-Party Tools and Resources

Custom Software Development: Insider Threats

Conclusion

Self-Service Kiosks for Effective Queue Management

The Evolution of Interactive Self-Service Kiosks

How Interactive Self-Service Kiosk Makes Queue Management More Effective?

Personalized Customer Experience

Reduction in Customer Wait Time

Digital and Cash Payments

Conclusion