ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to develop a checklist of questions for managers which will help them to identify the opportunities and risks inherent in the applications of new technologies. The arbitrary application of computers poses significant societal and organizational risks. The design of information systems should begin with an understanding of the context, the purpose and the meaning of information, and only then move on to such issues as the form and methods of communication, implementation, application, evaluation, justification and management. Commercial and social pressures, cultural incompatibilities, chaotic changes, resistance to change, unpredictable accidents, malice and sabotage should also be considered in technological decisions. The whole question of computer security and of more general emergent risk must be seen in a much broader social perspective. In the mid 1980s, top management made a determined stand against runaway cost escalation unjustified by business improvements.
