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Electronic Commerce is the buying and selling of goods, data or services from one person to another without the use of traditional paper or documents. The transaction is done online, through applications that rely on the internet. These applications include email, instant messaging, shopping carts, FTP, web services, and much more. Although e-commerce now relies on the internet, its origin was way before the internet made its debut. Then, e-commerce was more dependent on networks like EDI and EFT.
There are many subsets of E-Commerce that have evolved over the years. Some examples are Business-to-business (B2B), Business-to-consumer (B2C), Consumer-to-business (C2B), Consumer-to-consumer (C2C), Peer-to-peer (P2P), M-commerce, Business-to-Employee, E-learning, Collaborative Commerce, Social Commerce and E-marketing.
With new technology evolving every other day, E-commerce has to face quite a few challenges. These challenges can be divided into technological challenges, managerial and business challenges. Three basic challenges faced by E-Commerce are
- Security
Cyber crime has increased over the years. It has made electronic commerce and smooth transactions a scare for many businesses. It leads to identity theft, unauthorized access and even corruption of files.
- Costs of software infrastructure
Another challenge faced by E commerce is to cope up with the ever increasing costs of software and infrastructure needed to implement an E-Commerce site. From a personal perspective, the increasing price of owning home computer is also leading many people to not have access to the internet and E-Commerce.
- Social and cultural limitation
This challenge and limitation is by far the most difficult to handle. It is unlikely that any digital shopping experience will override the traditional shopping experience for the masses. Majority people still look forward to going out and having the ‘shopping experience.’
