We found that engagement with technology at events and delegate knowledge satisfactorily coexists for and across a number of different experiential levels. However, relative to I4.0, event research and the events industry appear to be digitally immature.

Events are in the midst of rapid social and technological change. With a growing variety of technological means, the industry is fast-paced and increasingly delivered to a discerning consumer market while finding ways to connect with consumers through technology

Digital technology is the thread of the fabric of organisations (Li et al., 2018). It is an increasingly important part of how they engage with their customers.

Moreover, engagement with events as fans, spectators, delegates or organisers can be augmented with digital technology by improving access and sociability capabilities, refining the personalisation of events, and thereby creating enhanced experiences.

As we advance into what many in business and academia consider to be a fourth industrial revolution, the capacity to control and exchange data electronically has extended our ability to create, edit, maintain, transmit and retrieve information.

I4.0 can be described as the digitisation and automation of the manufacturing environment. It also creates digital value chains to enable the communication between products, their environment and business partners. Digital applications have impacted the tourism sector too giving rise to ‘Tourism 4.0’

The events industry is an ideal environment to benefit from the implementation of a widespread digitised approach with numerous organisations empowering managers and improving the overall event experience with the integration of extensive ICT practices and systems.

With the more widespread adoption of digitalization in event delivery and as the supply chains of all events become intertwined with technology, we can learn how the digital maturity of events in the 21st century is shaping event management and event control.

The team set out to answer the following research questions: RQ1. Can digital maturity in events be defined? If so, RQ2. How should the levels of digital maturity of events be classified with regard to the digital maturity of the events industry and the development of event management theory?

Successful events are no longer measured by simply achieving a respectable attendance, a great deal more engagement is manifest through digital technologies

Successful events require organisers to create something that is considered by those who attend as a valuable and memorable experience (Pizam, 2010; Tung, 2011). Creating memorable event experiences can be described as being dependent on a number of factors including creating regular attendee engagement, providing appropriate activities, relevant subject matter, topical and contemporary focus and targeted to a sizable receptive audience.

technological factors being one of the most important areas of demand for companies along with the implementation of I4.0. SMEs (Small to medium enterprises) are [lagging] behind in developing strategies to implement new solutions.

The development of digital maturity in events can be compared to smart tourism, which Gretzel et al. (2015) expressed as a logical progression from traditional activities. Smart tourism is characterised by an ability to transform large amounts of data into enhanced tourist experiences and increased destination competitiveness thanks to the interconnection of the different stakeholders through latest ICT advancements

As the components of I4.0 become more prevalent in the events industry, much value can be obtained from understanding how businesses are adopting new levels of digital engagement in order to engage their audiences

it is prudent to suggest that the survival, and future success of events can depend upon digital maturity and transformation

owever, dealing with digital maturity requires careful attention as Neuhofer (2016) urges caution advising that applied technology solutions have proven to have the ability to create or destruct the value of the experience.

I4.0 therefore acknowledges the impact of connected computers with the key constituents being cyber-physical systems, the Internet of Things, cloud computing and cognitive computing

highlighted that the use of communication networks globally has risen dramatically and become ubiquitous due to the rise of smartphone ownership. This has been fuelled by social media, apps and faster broadband speeds to create a networked society

By combining the Internet of Things data and big data (extremely large data sets that may be analysed computationally to reveal patterns, trends and associations, especially relating to human behaviour and interactions), event managers are able to create a competitive advantage.

As event companies develop new and innovative ways to connect, the events themselves are absorbing aspects of I4.0 at every stage of the process; pushing the boundaries of event experiences far beyond the physical world

They are used to promote events before, during and after delivery and are used to gather data and inform decision-making. Generating responses from an event can be achieved using a number of methods and through both qualitative and quantitative data.

With the advent of big data and analytics, new sources of valuable data are available to guide decision-making processes in a more informed manner. Businesses were once looking at historical data, but advances in database technology and system processes have led to near real-time data collection and analytics

Failure to adopt aspects of digital technology does not necessarily suggest a poor experience or the end for those businesses less digitally mature; not every event business relies on this kind of data support to survive. Instead, this research provides an opportunity to better understand where event businesses do engage and more importantly, how communication between non-digital and fully integrated individuals/businesses can be improved.

Digital maturity and transformation today differs from previous periods as it not only provides the change in the main business processes but also reveals the concepts of smart and connected products through service-driven business models

Our analysis begins with an attempt to uncover the potential challenges, on-going developments and various strategies that will provide the events industry and academics with a forward-facing approach to the growth of technology within events. By including industry professionals and academics, the research contributes to bridging the gap between practise and academia.

Because the research and empirical data collection includes industry perspectives, we believe this research will provide value to event managers, marketers and practitioners around the world who wish to understand more about the digital maturity of events.

After conducting the social media analysis (1), it became evident that the discussions appeared to be around topics that utilise digital technology rather than the technology itself. Furthermore, and probably a reflection on the value of the group, a lot of the data included questions about understanding the topics rather than providing usable information to our research.

We did not have detailed information about the precise characteristics of the individuals who contributed to the dataset of posts. However, to an extent, their roles listed in LinkedIn were informative. These included events consultants, social media managers, marketing professionals, EventTech managers, CEOs at tech companies and events students.

Although this response rate of 52 academics may be considered low, this did allow for the creation of the initial insights into the E4.0 concept and crucially it provides a starting point to better understand the levels of the developing digital maturity model.

The most referenced themes were social media, marketing, apps, GDPR and mobile. The top 14 themes are shown in Figure 1 below.

The results of the thematic analysis reveal the most pertinent events and technology topics in this group in the time period specified. The most common topics were social media and marketing. Marketing appeared alongside other topics as a verb, a noun and an adjective. This certainly influenced its prominence.

This statement reinforces the knowledge and general use of social media during events. Mobile and event apps were recognised as presenting opportunities to enhance events and were considered to be a permanent part of events.

Carefully managed and fully integrated data and digital systems including social media, apps and CRM create digital value chains to enable the communication between events, their environment, and business partners.

Event organisers invest heavily on social media engagement and expect a great deal in return through social media retweets, tagging and sharing of images. However, it is just as important to understand if delegates consider technology at events that important.

Our expert respondents were asked if they considered the events industry to be at the cutting edge of technology. Responses were largely supportive of the suggestion that it is. 64% agree, 22% neither agree nor disagree and 14% disagree.

Online registration/digital booking was very familiar with 65% ‘extremely familiar’ with the technology.

The survey also collected a selection of qualitative data as respondents were asked to if there were any specific examples of connected/digital technology considered to be essential to the delivery of an event that had not been discussed in the survey. Significantly, 23% answered no to this question.

With regard to the digital maturity of the events industry affecting the development of event management theory, the literature review indicates that academics are making contributions to theory and a broad understanding of digital technology exists.

industry appears not to be digitally mature. Also, our findings suggest that relative to I4.0 not all events are digitally mature. Therefore, the ‘digital immaturity’ of the events industry may be having some effect on event management theory

It became evident from the survey that many respondents suggested they were not familiar with technology that they would all have experienced.

The results from the survey suggest that widespread academic understanding of technology at events is extensive. Some digital technology is considered routine, while other comprehensively used technology appears to be unfamiliar to the end user.

The growing digital maturity levels form the foundation for E4.0 and will contribute to what Gerbert (2015) described as greater efficiencies and changing traditional relationships among suppliers, producers, and customers.

Therefore, satisfaction from the event comes down to providing delegates with the right communication levels they need to complete their individual objectives. This can range from the most basic social engagement to the gathering or observation of big data. Events are evidently a melting pot of experiences and goals and not all of them demand the highest levels of technology to complete.

Artificial intelligence has the ability to provide events with endless systems that sense, learn and decide throughout the delivery process though many gaps exist.

The data also indicates that there is good knowledge across all types of digital technology. This is reassuring for the development of education as the events industry embraces digitalisation

However, as more value is placed on the use of digital technology and events mature through greater access to technology, we see the emergence of an E4.0 era.

Thus, this model anticipates that events will grow in their digital maturity to level E3 and E4. Thus, digital technologies may become sufficiently embedded so that data related to one element of an event will be used to inform other elements of an event in real time

Online registration and wearable technologies such as delegate smart badges are superficial digital experiences and only considered as a process rather than as a fully perceived digital experience.

Our findings indicate that digital communications have enabled a shift in the content of events, marketing and the use of social media as a communication tool before, during and after the event.

On the limitations of our research, one might argue that engagement with technology, or indeed lack of it, does not provide evidence of the immaturity of digital technology in events. However, the digital maturity model that we propose is principally informed by the literature on digital technology and events.

This research has provided a revealing perspective on the use of digital technology in events. It has built on theory that has been previously developed in this and similar subjects of research, such as business and tourism. From this, the research can claim a number of contributions. It (i) provides an empirical investigation into how event businesses and individuals engage with digitally technology at events, and (ii) it provides a definition of E4.0 and other preceding levels that contribute to digital maturity.

Our research has shown that event delegates are aware of the ability to communicate in a reciprocal process with technology rather than through a linear/top down process. This in itself is evidence of E4.0. Furthermore, this research highlights how industry is continually striving to optimise the delegate/event relationship through apps and other technology. The industry’s on-going mission to create deeply flexible communication opportunities is eliminating the possibility of gaps in the communication process in order to optimise delegate engagement at events.

A broader discussion on potential issues such as IT & data security, skill-sets, expensive production costs and outages; these are significant problems within internet and cloud-based technology. Furthermore, the emerging topic of E4.0 itself requires both conceptual and empirical development.

This research has shown that there remains a great deal to discover about the use of technology at events and many opportunities exist for further research from academics and practitioners working together to provide mutual benefits for both industry and education.

The four leading technologies which have showed a high adoption rate from the industry and have received attention from academia are: self-service, wireless, green, and security technologies. The advantages of these technologies for hoteliers include enhanced customer services and operational efficiency (Doyle, 2007), decreased guest wait times, more efficient methods to settle bills (Singh & Kasavana, 2005), reduction of energy costs (Meeroff & Scarlatos, 2007), and protection of sensitive customer data and credit card numbers

In addition, exploring the influential factors of security system usage will provide greater depth of knowledge with respect to why some hotels have adopted more security systems than others.

there is still a lack of understanding of the nature of risk associated with inadequate IT security, especially among operators of hotels that do not have their own IT departments.

Self-service technologies are commonly defined as devices or applications which permit users to produce a service independent from the direct involvement of the service provider (Meuter, Ostrom, Roundtree, & Bitner, 2000). The use of self-service technologies in the hotel industry has grown considerably, especially in the areas of self check-in, in-room check-out, and foodservice kiosks

IT systems refer to general support systems such as mainframe computer, mid-range computer, and local area network.

Some of the most significant wireless technology applications involve the use of mobile handheld devices, such as personal digital assistants (PDA), tablet PCs, and cellular phones, or RFID (radio frequency identification). RFID utilizes computer chips and antennas, allowing the chips to wirelessly communicate with a receiver.

While the major usage of RFID in the hotel industry was for inventory control purposes, it also has the potential to be utilized in ways that can provide more conveniences for the guests.

Other possible uses include placing RFID tags on items of high value as a means of theft prevention or integrating tags into guest loyalty cards for easy identification

IT investment that lowers environmental impact and IT that manages the environmental impact of other systems are commonly referred to as “green technology”

Many hoteliers might think becoming more environmentally friendly will cost more for their hotels. However, it has been demonstrated that “going green” is not only the right thing to do for the environment but also provides tangible bottom-line benefits for hotels by reducing consumption of energy and water, as well as other related costs.

Some of the risk factors involved include reliability, security, and privacy issues

risk associated with a breach of IT systems security (e.g., network break-ins) is very high. Consequently, no sector of the business community is exempt from attacks on their IT systems, with an attack being defined as a technique used to exploit a system’s vulnerabilities.

Many of these attacks involve attempts by thieves to gain access to customer credit card data, and these attempts constitute a major portion of the risk inherent in IT security

if a system is breached and the merchant is not PCI compliant, the merchant then is responsible for all costs associated with improperly used credit card information taken from that system (Kress, 2008). These losses could bankrupt a business if the security breach goes undetected for even a short time.

IT security systems are those measures taken to protect the confidentiality and integrity of proprietary data.

two main paradigms of adoption are believed to occur: bottom-up adoption and top-down adoption.

Thus, it is reasonable to assume that organizational factors (e.g., financial factor, human resource) will influence the implementation stage of security systems at a hotel.

A hotel with sufficient IT budget will install more security systems than those with insufficient IT budget.

That is, if a hotel does not have its own IT department, it will have a negative influence on successfully installing or maintaining necessary security systems.

A hotel with its own IT department will install more security systems than those without.

Overall, the state of IT spending on security continues undiminished because managed security services are required for almost every application (Communications News, 2007).

A hotel with more technologies being utilized will install more security systems than those with fewer technologies.

Given the importance of security and privacy at a luxury hotel, this study expects luxury properties to have installed more security systems than other segments

Most hotel employees use their property management systems for hotel operations and should be able to check their e-mails.

To justify the low response rate, previous studies which have compared response rates of mail and e-mail for surveys were reviewed.

The sample obtained in this study represented the targeted sample: over 80% of the respondents were working in hotel operations. Furthermore, the purpose of this study was to explore hotel operators’ insight of technology usage, IT budget, and security measures rather than to confirm existing theories or to generalize the results.

The respondents were asked to select from a total of fourteen securities related systems

The profile of the respondents revealed that they were experienced hoteliers with more than ten years experience in the industry

Fifty-three percent of the respondents reported that they were with chain hotels that would be considered mid-range properties with an average of 175 rooms (median of 107). Over 80% of the respondents reported working in operations, while fewer than 4% reported working in either IT or engineering (Table 1).

Nearly 70% of the respondents’ properties did not have their own IT department (69.2% did not have, and 30.8% had their own IT departments, n = 234, missing data = 10).

Fifty-three percent of them (n = 244) thought the most important goal for hotel technology would be enhancing the customer’s experience.

second identified goal was utilizing technology to help generate revenue (41%)

differentiate properties from their competition (20%), to lower expenses (16%), and to increase security (6%).

Internet kiosks in the lobby represented the most frequently used self-service technology (36.5%, n = 244), followed by kiosks for airline check-in/board pass

With respect to security systems currently in use, antivirus security systems represented the most frequently used security system (92.2%), followed by hardware firewalls, software firewalls, physical security, and encrypted login security systems.

intrusion detection was the most frequently identified system (15.6%), followed by vulnerability assessment scanning (13.5%), Internet scanning (13.1%), antivirus (11.5%), digital ID server (11.5%), and nonreusable passwords (9.8%; Table 2).

Thus, the hypothesis was supported that there was a linear relationship between the three factors and the adequacy of security systems.

The positive standardized coefficient (β) of .389 indicates that there was a statistically significant (p < .001) linear relationship between IT usage (the number of wireless, self-service, and green technologies a hotel was using) and the adequacy of security systems

The study revealed certain things of interest, the most significant of which is the need for greater emphasis on IT security among hoteliers.

only about 30% of all respondents reported having their own IT departments. Since budget hotel properties are extremely unlikely to have an IT department, it is highly likely that the very large majority of IT decisions throughout the industry are being made by hotel operators for whom IT is not their primary area of concern.

Furthermore, the focus of hoteliers for future IT implementations is enhancing the guest experience (53%) and generating revenue (41%). Very few respondents (6%) identified increasing security as a 5-year IT goal.

While almost all respondents use information systems as part of their jobs, very few are trained in the development, maintenance, and secure use of these systems.

no correlation was found between the respondents’ perceived adequacy of their IT budgets and the adequacy of installed security systems, as adequacy of IT budget did not appear as a significant term in the regression analysis.

Nearly 10% of respondents do not have so much as anti-virus protection for their systems, and nearly half do not even take simple physical precautions to protect their IT systems.

we note that no correlation exists between the respondents’ perceived adequacy of their IT budgets and the number of installed IT security systems, as the number of installed systems was not a significant factor in the regression analysis.

the large majority of respondent properties do not have their own IT departments. Second, the people making IT decisions generally do not have IT backgrounds or training. Third, the large majority of respondent properties have little more than firewalls or antivirus software to protect their proprietary data, and these systems alone are not adequate to meet PCI standards, as they do not take steps to encrypt and protect cardholder data, maintain a vulnerability management program, implement strong access control measures, regularly monitor and test their networks, and maintain an information security policy as required by the Security Standards Council.

it is reasonable to conclude that the respondents did not have an adequate understanding of the nature of the IT security hazards facing them for the average property does not have installed systems adequate to meet PCI standards, yet they reported having adequate budgets.

In order to adequately protect proprietary data, one must have an understanding of network security, which is an understanding apart from software functionality.

Properties with their own IT departments, however, reported that they had a higher number of installed IS security systems than did those properties without their own IT departments.

roperties without their own IT departments, in particular, have a less adequate understanding of their IT security needs than may be necessary.

This study found hoteliers’ lack of attention to security provision, training in IT, and PCI compliance can place hoteliers at great risk. For example, the cost of a single incident at a noncompliant property could result in the loss of the entire business.

It will be useful to examine the reasons why luxury properties are more likely to employ adequate security measures to determine whether this greater use is attributable to better understanding of security issues or some other factor.

The study was limited by the nature of online surveys; the response rate was quite low. Future studies could test the proposed research model via paper-based mail surveys to increase a response rate.

Gaining competitive advantage [7] such as, IT security investments may stop the competitors to absorb market power. From other studies that point to problems appearing in hospitality to find out if the IT they invested is effective, [8] asserts that many hospitality companies have no procedures to see how effectively their spending on information technology is.

Various sources of data that show about IT investment in the hotel, then the problem is the existence of large amount of investment for IT development without understanding IT effectiveness for the hotel [11], the managerial party who difficult to give data about the values and intangible/tangible benefits.

According to [14], an IT investment consists of the total life cycle cost of an entire project or project chunk that involves IT, including the post-project operating cost of the system that was implemented. The investment ceases to exist when it is replaced or eliminated for any reason.

Evaluating expense or impact of large IT investment may vary from study to study [15]. In order to evaluate IT investment, Information Economics (IE) is a set of calculating tools to measure the benefits and costs of an information technology project.

The benefits of IT/IS that organizations use can be viewed by combining Simple ROI analysis and analysis of technology and business domain.

This study using Information Economic approach in order to do feasibility assessment that combine technology domain and business domain

The data collected includes the financial data of 5-star hotels and IT projects undertaken, as well as the costs for the technology used today. This stage is also done spread the questionnaire online for intangible value analysis of business domain and technology domain

The feasibility of IT investment can be known ROI score generated on the economic impact sheet. According to [23], to calculate simple ROI, there are three worksheets, such as: development cost sheet using ratio, ongoing work sheet, and economic impact sheet. The final value of the ROI and the scores of corporate analysis is incorporated into the IE

The Scores on the IE Scorecard will show the value and benefits of investment for IT.

The huge demand for the Internet makes many hotels present the speed and bandwidth that can satisfy the guests.

E-Concierge Service Management. Service to entertain hotel guests and modern travelers is currently working with smartphones in the form of E-Concierge Mobile with technology called Mobile Guest Softphone (MGS).

IT Security, the problem that arises when using IT in a company/organization is its security. For companies/organizations and even hotels are also very vulnerable to information that can harm the hotel in case of cyber attack.

According to Table 2, Mandarin Oriental Hotel ROI score is 1. This score means that the IT investment is feasible. Above 100% for Simple ROI means that IT implementation give profitability to the hotel and able to invest more in the future

Value Linking approach implemented in 5-star hotel, implementation online reservation and e-Concierge management, hotel guests can quickly make room reservations and guest data collection will be better. For e-Concierge the process of entering guests to the room will also be easier

This value showed that 5-star hotels in Jakarta have the time and opportunity to invest more in the future. Therefore, it is necessary to focus on future growth and development of existing infrastructure.

It can be concluded that IT implementation and IT projects in 5-star hotels in Jakarta are quite useful. E-Concierge, mobile apps and online reservation are most valuable and success investment for 5-star hotel. But, in order to improve the performance of hotel IT, which in terms of security and improve hotel services, need a system improvement in accordance with the hotel program, so it can support the vision and mission of 5-star hotels in Jakarta.

The result of financial analysis that is calculated ratio and processed in economic impact sheet obtained simple ROI and can be concluded that in terms of cost, IT investment in 5-star hotels in Jakarta can provide economic benefits for the hotel.

The investment quadrant shows that a 5-star hotel has a solid business base, has the time and opportunity to invest in the future. The 5-star hotels in Jakarta also have the time and opportunity to invest more in the future. Therefore, it is necessary to focus on future growth and development of existing infrastructure.

This value indicates that IT investment in 5-star hotel in Jakarta is considered economical enough, and quite helpful and useful in supporting hotel business process.

To meet targets, it is typical for companies to put additional stresses on their internal control structures by reducing head counts, requiring employees to perform more than one job, and rearranging risk profiles

The deceptive and corrupt business practicesofthesecompaniesandothersresulted largely from a failure of corporate governance and lack of ethical business practices, in which internal control mechanisms were circumvented by conflicts of interest that enriched executives and damaged shareholders

Deficiencies are often observed through review of the main business cycles: revenue and receivables, purchasing and payables, treasury and stock, and financial reporting

Internal controls are often the first avenue of protection in safeguarding assets and thwarting and discovering errors and fraud

Some research has been conducted in this area, and findings suggest that companies in the telecommunications, technology, financial, and services industries experience the most difficulty with SarbanesOxley compliance efforts because of increased risk of fraud from industry and company risk factors

Therefore, pressure resulting from expectations of financial performance, opportunity to circumvent internal controls, and rationalization coupled with certain inherent industry factors may contribute to increased risk of fraud

opportunity to engage in unethical behavior may stem from the macro environment, the operational features, and the specific nature of the business cycles

Because of this potential for fraud on the company, shareholders, and the public, examining the conditions that may prompt fraud is necessary for the efficiency of the restaurant industry, and namely, for those passive and active investors that are relying on the financial statements to be true and accurate

the restaurant industry is often susceptible to deficiencies because of its inherent characteristics and high control risk

Corporate scandals, misappropriation of assets and financial statement misstatement are all very real threats to the restaurant industry.

the central focus of this study is to understand the factors that contribute to increased risk of fraud to determine why fraud may occur despite the imposed regulation of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

numerous researchers have found indication that executive stock option compensation provides encouragements for behavior that is fraudulent or corrupt

the study seeks to identify the factors that may provide the optimal criteria to engage in fraudulent or opportunistic behavior, using the incidence of a reported control deficiency as the measurable dependent variable.

The fraud triangle is the model that explains the factors that may cause an individual or a company to commit occupational fraud.

The differing classifications and definitions of pressure provide evidence that the construct is not directly observable; therefore, researchers in this field have measured the construct of pressure through proxy variables

consists of three constructs: pressure/motivation, opportunity, and rationalization. The three constructs offer an explanation as to why management commits fraud, and the dynamic relationship that underlies the acts of occupational fraud.

pressure may best be classified into four general types that may lead to fraud: financial stability, external pressure, manager’s personal financial situations, and meeting financial targets (

when considering measurements of external pressures relating to debt financing, the financial leverage ratio is the most common measurement of the amount of debt.

Both pressures and opportunities are often determined by factors that occur at both the individual and company level (

ROA, or asset composition, is an appropriate proxy measurement for the pressure of meeting financial targets.

according to the fraud triangle, it can be said that opportunity does not exist unless a pressure exists.

nonshareable problems could also motivate groups of individuals, representative of a company’s culture, to commit fraud.

Opportunity is described as an atmosphere or temporary environment that enables fraud to be committed, usually with a small perceived probability of being caught or reprimanded

In a study of Swedish restaurant companies, it is noted that competition is very high, often resulting in price wars among different companies that reduce prices and then try to compensate through increased sales

Some risk factors include the susceptibility of the industry to market changes as well as the nature of the industry, coupled with the specific operations of the company such as whether there are significant or complex international operations; how effective management is at monitoring activities within the organization; and the level of complexity that exists in the organization

This environment is therefore dependent on the discretionary income of consumers, and this increased pressure may lead to earnings mismanagement through overstatement.

Public companies in the restaurant industry are susceptible to opportunities for fraud on the basis of the aforementioned opportunities

The ability to commit fraud in the restaurant industry results from inside knowledge of processes and procedures, and the ability to circumvent controls through weaknesses (

strong evidence has also linked the CEO position to fraud when the CEO is also the Chairman of the Board. In incidences like this, the CEO is the dominate decision maker for an organization that may provide an increased opportunity for fraud.

The underlying reason for these three categories of increased opportunities for fraud is the state of the internal controls structure, and management’s commitment to strong corporate governance

Rationalization is essentially an attitude, belief, or position of the mind or ethical personality that enables an employee or group of employees of a company to intentionally misappropriate assets and then defend their dishonest activities

Weak corporate governance structures are often presented through ineffective monitoring of management.

A quantifiable means of capturing this could be through review of executive stock compensation measures.

excessive use of discretionary accruals may lead to poor audit opinions, providing a rationalized thought for business activities.

the nature of the restaurant industry is often described as a periodic, seasonal, and cyclic trade

Defining parameters for financial reporting can also have an effect on reducing the rationalized behavior and the opportunity to commit fraud

Because these conditions have an obvious effect on earnings and measures of success, this seasonal variability and volatility should be considered when analyzing pressures in the restaurant industry

For restaurant companies, this means that rationalizations and attitudes can be managed by assessing the internal control environment and understanding the pressures and opportunities that exist for employees.

Some restaurant industry pressures that may impact profitable sales growth include a lack of understanding of the consumer’s perception, including the relevance of existing brands, and delays in opening new restaurants. Likewise, an inability to consider cost pressures, including increasing fees for supplies, utilities, and health care providers contracted by restaurants, as well as an incapability of obtaining economies of scale in procurement, could compress margins and negatively impact sales and operations profit margin.

The value in the application of the fraud triangle to the restaurant industry provides an opportunity to extend theoretical contributions that originated from mainstream accounting to hospitality literature, which is severely lacking in the current literature

Likewise, restaurant companies that are smaller (and therefore may not have strong internal controls) with increasingly complex transactions create additional opportunities for fraud to be committed

competitiveness is a condition that makes meeting financial targets difficult and provides opportunity for fraudulent behavior. External pressure from analysts and investors may create an incentive to misappropriate assets, which, in turn, distorts common financial measures of success such as return on assets.

when debt financing exists, in order to address past and future obligations, and remain competitive, restaurant companies are at an increased risk of fraud especially when disruptions in financial and credit markets exist.

Studies have revealed that restaurant company victory and demise is eventually correlated to restaurant leadership abilities and intentions; therefore, it can be stated that executives and managers’ intentions are of utmost concern in understanding risk of fraud

firms with increasingly complex operations coupled with changes in organizational structure have less resources to put into internal controls and are therefore at an increased risk for accounting errors.

.Internationalgrowthissubjecttorisks such as international political and economic conditions, foreign currency fluctuations, and divergent cultures and consumer inclinations

This study will focus on the variables most pertinent to the restaurant industry on the basis of the inherent characteristics of U.S. publicly traded restaurant companies, as previously described in this section.

a s a result of workforce diversity and the presence of many perceived low-skilled workers. In addition, as companies within the industry respond to declining performance, publicly traded restaurant companies may be subject to activist investors who wish to see a change in the executive management team. If a shake-up such as this would occur, the organizational structure of the company may become unstable, resulting in much greater opportunities for fraud to occur at all levels.

this study looks to assess the relation between the amount of debt a company has occurred and the incidence of reported internal control deficiencies.

Variables relating to rationalization are present in the restaurant industry when considering the motivations and attitudes of management. It is noted that in difficult times, such as the Recession, aggressive financial reporting tactics may be used

this study seeks to understand the effect of substantial stock compensation on increased fraud risk.

this study also hypothesizes that poor ROA could increase the risk of fraud, as the pressure provides executive management with the motivation to manipulate earnings.

this study suggests that the organizational structure of the company may provide opportunity for increased fraud risk through a unitary tone at the top.

this study analysed the disclosures of publicly traded restaurant companies to determine whether a company has a higher probability of increased fraud risk on the basis of the presented variables.

The results of the applied probit model reveal for the entire population set of publicly traded restaurant companies that the macroeconomic factors of the Recession, interest rate, inflation rate and unemployment rate all have a significant impact on the increased risk of fraud, as evidenced through a reported internal control deficiency.

As noted in the overall model, the results reveal that the model as a whole is a significant fit to the data. Although the company-level variables were not significant in the overall model, external factors were each significant.

Therefore, it can be said that the results of this study empirically support the intuition that changes in macroeconomic conditions may impact increased risk of fraud for companies in the restaurant industry.

It can be said that there is a significant relation between increased risk of fraud and the macroeconomic factors of interest, inflation, and unemployment rates.

from a managerial perspective, the study provides evidence that macroeconomic conditions that might affect consumer demand may increase the risk of fraud for publicly traded restaurant companies.

In addition to the high costs of compliance, it is also important to recognize additional managerial characteristics that may heighten the effects of the macroeconomic conditions on increased fraud risk.

As indicated by the results of the study, however, many times executive management does not recognize the problems associated with the macroeconomic conditions because of systematic perceptual filters that play the crucial role in the functioning of the company.

By focusing on the changing macroeconomic conditions that may have an empirical effect on demand, executive leadership will be able to streamline processes to avoid incidences of reporting internal control deficiencies when exposed to the macroeconomic conditions.

In the restaurant industry in particular, information is also not readily quantifiable, which makes it even more difficult to transform into meaningful and timely information for executive management. Particular examples include consumer insights and how well new promotions are received and moved throughout the market.

it should be noted that reported internal control deficiencies are indicative of increased fraud risk, but not necessarily conclusive that fraud has occurred. Therefore, just because a company has reported a deficiency, it does not indicate fraud, necessarily.

According to the model, the managerial factors are only exacerbated by the presence of macroeconomic factors.

the identified conditions could help managers to improve internal control when a high risk factor is realized. The contribution of this study may allow restaurant companies to deter activities that may result in increased risk of fraud.

Because the study revealed that the macroeconomic conditions were significant for the entire population of restaurant companies, an area of future research might explore the relevance of the co alignment model (Olsen &R o p e r , 1998) to strategic management decisions to reduce the risk of fraud.

for purposes of this study, privately traded companies are excluded. This is a limitation of the study because the results may indicate a problem that is more or less pervasive since the sample is representative of a small number of companies in the United States.

the model is limited in application because it does not take into account fluctuations among the variables over time.

the largest problem and reason that every restaurant doesn’t im plement a handheld POS system is cost. Even though the costs are starting to come down, it is still a pricey investment especially for smaller restaurants.

This market provides a large opportunity for the handheld wireless POS system in today’s customer satisfaction driven industry, especially since the once costly systems are finally poised to make the transition from niche product to mainstream acceptance

These benefits lead to cost savings and return on investment for the pur chase of a handheld POS system. Customers are the reasons restaurants are in business, and the time saved by using a handheld device, rather than waiting in line to place an order on a traditional POS system that averages over four min utes per order, can be used to better serve the guests.

Handhelds can also ensure accuracy by prompting servers with cooking temperatures and salad dressing choices and also offering up-selling suggestions.

One option for the handheld devices is a portable receipt printer that can allow servers to print out checks instantly without waiting in line at the POS station. Customers can also pay immediately if the handheld POS systems also offer credit card payment capability with a swipe area built into the unit.

This tech nology can also be used to inform a server when an item has been 86’d (no lon ger available) enabling the customer to make another selection immediately rather than finding out minutes later having the guest be even more disap pointed.

a key advantage to what handheld POS system a restaurant purchases will be what ports it has to hook up bar-code readers, cash drawers, voice-over IP capability, printers, fingerprint recognition and other emerging technologies

Some handhelds can even be used for back office inventory control before the restaurant opens by de-coupling software applications onto the interface (On Technology, 2004). Other benefits will be handheld systems that are easy to upgrade and service.

While many of the drawbacks and problems are only perceived or occur only in early models, some are still around today and just emerging.

Handheld wireless Point of Sale (POS) systems are a portable version of a POS system, which is defined as the time and place in which a transaction is made. Point of sale computer systems include cash registers, optical scanners, magnetic card readers, and special terminals.

Restaurants need to budget for installation costs, training costs, printing materials, system supplies, electricity, power protec tion devices, software upgrades, modifications and the costs of supporting the systems/improvements (Scavone, 2003). These costs add up quickly.

Also, needing complex and error-prone configuration actions, like configuring security settings, is another security drawback

RevPASH, or revenue per available seat-hour, is the mathematical way to see the value of purchasing a handheld wireless POS system.

Although restaurant problems such as reservation issues cannot be solved with easier more efficient POS systems, such issues of duration management can.

operators could realize a 9% increase in revenue if managers “cut dining time from one hour to 55 minutes, without making customers feel rushed.”

If the cause of a restaurant’s long table time and low turnover is due to the time it takes servers to get the order from the guest to the kitchen and also the time is takes a guest to close out a check, then implementing handhelds would be a way to shorten the length of those times.

Unfortunately, going handheld doesn’t solve all problems, and the kitchen overcooked a guest’s filet mignon. Mike handles the situation by apologizing and notifying the manager on his handheld wireless POS system.

use the same handheld device during the day but load it up as an inventory device and complete her inventory and or dering in 1/3 the amount of time, thanks to the same radio frequency identifica tion technology that lets the hostesses and servers know who is in the restaurant.

When a customer signs up for a customer appreciation card, all of their preferences are stored in the cus tomer database

These marketing attempts have helped bring in more business.

The menu is also more effective because data mining was used to determine what items bring in the most revenue, what items have the highest margin, and what less popular items are most popular with customers who bring in a large amount of business.

This market provides a large opportunity for the handheld wireless POS sys tem in today’s customer satisfaction driven industry, especially since the once costly systems are finally poised to make the transition from niche product to mainstream acceptance

It is crucial for tourism and hospitality practitioners to proactively incorporate new technologies into their businesses as these will improve service quality and differentiate their products and services.

In order to be able to follow the increasing guests' requests for qualitative services, it is mandatory for hotel management to constantly work on improving its functions and operations. For this it is necessary to keep track of innovations in sectors outside the hospitality, like IT sector that works on creating, developing and introducing new technologies

Hospitality is one of targeted sector that is considered appropriate for application of cloud technologies and services. Hotel Management System or widely known as Property Management System (PMS) is one of the system where IT practitioners saw the chance for improvement by ''moving it to the cloud''.

Hotels will be forced to upgrade their current systems so that they can respond to various and changeable guests' habits and requirements. However, until today, there was not enough academic papers related to usage of cloud technology in hospitality industry even though this sector is under continuous changes caused by usage of new technologies which made search, evaluation and payment of the hotel rooms easier than ever.

After comparing the two groups of hotels, from which one was using desktop PMS and other group cloud- based PMS, the results of the research were derived and presented. In conclusion of the paper, challenges with which the hotels are facing and which affect their decision of starting to use cloud- based technology as well as recommendation for future work will be discussed.

As stated by the Sharif (2010), cloud computing is the latest technology that is being introduced by the IT industry as the next (potential) revolution to change how the internet and information systems operate. The term “cloud” was probably inspired by IT text books’ illustrations which depicted remote environments (the Internet) as cloud images in order to conceal the complexity that lies behind them (Sultan,2010).

The goal of a new computing world is to develop software for millions to consume by easily accessing it over a network. Cloud service providers are making profit by charging consumers for accessing these services.

Products offered via this mode include the remote delivery (through the Internet) of a full computer infrastructure (e.g., virtual computers, servers, storage devices, etc.); the building blocks of an IT enterprise.

Services provided in this category include CPU processing on demand, virtual Web hosting, and storage on demand. The most notable vendors are Amazon’s EC2, GoGrid’s Cloud Servers, and Joyent.

With cloud computing, services and applications that were managed locally in the past requiring hardware, operating systems, web servers, as well as teams of network, database and system management experts are now provided remotely by cloud providers under this layer.

Cloud computing services can be adopted by firms in three different forms (Goscinski and Brock, 2010):

Public clouds - online applications that are open to everyone for free, such as Google

Private clouds - involves firms deploying key enabling technologies, such as virtualization and multi-tenant applications, to create their own private cloud database

Hybrid clouds - mix of the previous two types that are emerging with the intention of providing clients with a level of “control” over their resources

The cloud offers enterprises the option of scalability without the financial commitments required for infrastructure purchase and maintenance.

Reallocating information management operational activities to the cloud offers businesses a unique opportunity to focus efforts on innovation and research and development. This allows for business and product growth and may be even more beneficial than the financial advantages offered by the cloud.

These investments and efforts for a new technology to be presented open a new progress circle of technology advancements and it continues in the same way.

When creating software or an application for a hotel, IT personnel have to possess a certain level of flexibility, openness and creativity. On the other hand, hotel employees are expected to have more insightful and openminded approach towards new ways of performing business operations, sometimes take risks and have experiences with using different programs and applications.

A hotel's PMS can gather and keep valuable information about hotel guests by incorporating business intelligence tools which help hoteliers organize and make sense of the gathered data. Regardless of whether room reservations come from Online Travel Agency, Global Distribution Systems or by telephone, all of them are gathered, stored and managed in the PMS.

Simplicity of the cloud based property management system allows it to be productive. Cloud based PMS's can operate on any advice that has a web browser and the companies are putting their efforts to make it even more friendly on smaller devices like tablets and smart phones.

Business intelligence options provide hoteliers with a threedimensional view of guest data, which allows easily statistical reporting and increased hotel management efficiency.

The aim of this study was to investigate the difference in practical usage of the two types of PMS systems – cloud based and classical (desktop) ones.

On the question about the reasons for using the current PMS type in hotels, answers of Group A were based on usage of their current PMS for years and on the fact that employees in all hotel departments were used to work on it. As time passed by, hotels upgraded their system to new versions for several times and additional customization was implemented with regard to hotel preferences.

Hotels from Group B were consisted of relatively new boutique hotels that operate for more than a year and from those that were not using any kind of PMS solution (they were using Excel tables and creating reservation records manually). The reason why hotels from this group wanted to use cloud PMS was a desire to try the latest technology used in hospitality industry.

Other reasons for using it were: PMS could be reached from any place where Internet connection is available, simple but effective design with lots of visual solutions, more options to enter the important information and the fact that it is working not only on any PC but also on any mobile device due to its mobile applications.

low investment costs were main reason for hotels from Group B to decide in favor of cloud based version.

The similar amount of initial investments were confirmed by the Group A. Being considered as great amount of money for newly opened and small sized hotels to invest, management decided to try out the cloud version which allows access to this system based on monthly subscription with very little or no investment cost, depending on the solution provider.

After initial investments in the system implementation, hardware, software and training of employees, every year hotel makes a one-year-based contract for additional support services and, if needed, extra training. Support is provided any time a hotel reports an issue or malfunction by directly connecting to hotel's computer through remote programs.

Changes are made either for each hotel at a time, or after releasing new version, when provider try to convince all the current users to upgrade to it. Upgrade is provided by the extra charge, so these costs should be also considered during planning investments in classical PMS.

Regardless of which type of system they used, all participants were very careful about and interested in the matter of data security.

However, it is totally different situation with cloud based system, which is mainly open system where all authorized users and providers from outside have access to. Of course, it is up to hotel management to whom the authorization rights will be given and being an open system it makes support, development and innovation activities much easier. Cloud based PMS are hosted on some of the world's best known servers so there is no need for additional computers to be used as servers.

Although there are some great differences in functions and way of managing regarding classical and cloud based system, both have their advantages from which hotels do not want to give up.

One of the biggest advantages of cloud based PMS for the Group B is the fact that this system can be directly integrated with hotel online booking engine. This is considered as a great advantage for the hotels that besides having functional web site, wish to maximize use of its online booking engine, receive more online reservations directly from the guests and gain more profit.

Such a functional connection between hotel’s PMS and online reservation system allow hotels to have a social media integration as well. This means that hotels are able to receive online reservation through their Facebook page as well as receive direct links to its page from the biggest review sites such as TripAdvior.com.

In this paper two different approaches and perspectives on usage of cloud based and classical hotel management systems were exposed. Hotels from Group B have shown a tendency for usage of new technologies and readiness to adopt and continuously learn about them.

Among factors, affecting why hotel prefers one system over another, are type and size of hotel, through which channels are guest reservations coming, previous experience with IT stuff and different programs, etc.

Cloud based program can help them in order to update prices and room availability information to hotel's booking engine. This prevents overbooking, provides easily management of CRM functions and information, with no first investment costs or extra expenses which results in revenue increase.

Hotels that use classical PMS pay a great attention to the security issue because they do not want to risk opening their hotel for external intervention. In recent years we can find in media lots of evidence of information linkage from system that had much higher security measures than an average hotel.

Measuring the performance of cloud-provided services is another challenge for the hotel management, primarily due to the lack of measurement standards.

While investigating the previous knowledge about the other system solutions, hotels in Group A have claimed lack of information about the cloud technology and its solutions.

Even though IT stuff in these hotels has some basic knowledge about it, it is still not enough to convince the other managers about its benefits. Therefore it may be concluded that, besides trying to overcome the above mentioned challenges, developers of cloud based solutions to hotels should also work hard on training the potential clients about the positive aspects and correct usage of cloud technologies.

Lack of measurement standards for cloud-provided services in general as well as for hotels is another important limitation due to which qualitative research was conducted. Authors’ recommendation is that academicians should focus more on topics of cloud computing, cloud solutions for other business operations and on defining measurements standards for cloud services.

The role of dive supervision was assessed by recording dive guide interventions underwater, and how this was affected by dive group size.

Over recent decades, tourism activities benefiting from the pleasing aesthetics and biodiversity of coral reefs, primarily SCUBA diving and snorkelling, have experienced rapidly increasing numbers of participants globally

We found evidence that the ability of dive guides to intervene and correct diver behaviour in the event of a reef contact decreases with larger diver group sizes. Divers from operators with high levels of compliance with the Green Fins programme exhibited significantly lower reef contact rates than those from dive operators with low levels of compliance.

Damage to corals on dived reefs often occurs as a result of skeletal breakage, particularly in branching species (Guzner et al. 2010;H a s l e ra n dO t t 2008). Tissue abrasion can also result from diver contact (Hawkins et al. 1999), and a recent study reported a higher incidence of coral disease in areas heavily used for recreational diving

It is possible that other diver characteristics such as qualification level or dive experience may affect the ability to respond to dive briefings, although several studies have failed to find a correlation between divers’ reef contact rates and experience

Due to the difficulties of effectively addressing global stressors, an emerging recommendation is the focus of coral reef management on local scales (e.g. Anthony et al. 2014). A frequent challenge facing managers and policy makers at local levels relates to the maximisation of tourism benefits whilst simultaneously reducing its environmental impacts

Alternatively, previous experience and possible affinity and attachment to a specific dive site may influence how closely divers follow pre-dive briefings and affect their behaviour underwater, as suggested by place attachment theory

The methodologies which have been developed to minimise the environmental impact of SCUBA diving on coral reefs can be summarised as follows: (1) managing or restricting diver numbers, (2) regulating the locations in which SCUBA diving activities occur, (3) regulating the types of equipment used, and 4) implementing programmes which seek to manage the methods used by the dive industry in providing their services. Restricting diver numbers is based on the concept of a reef dive site’s ‘carrying capacity’; a level beyond which diving impacts become readily apparent.

Restriction of SCUBA diving equipment has focused on banning the use of accessories believed to increase reef contacts within marine protected areas such as gloves, muck sticks, or underwater cameras; however, such regulations are often unpopular within the SCUBA diving community

Governments and reef managers seek evidence that the effort expended in implementing programmes translates into measurable benefits; however, research into the effectiveness of such programmes at influencing diver behaviour and reducing diving impacts is limited.

In this study, we focused on dive operators participating in the Green Fins diving programme at three major dive locations within the Philippines.

Nonetheless, levels of dive supervision underwater would intuitively appear to be linked to rates of reef contact, and when examined, the willingness of dive guides to intervene in correcting diver behaviour underwater has been found to significantly reduce diver contact rates

Malapascua Island, Moalboal, and Puerto Galera.

divers may have been aware that a Green Fins compliance assessment was taking place, but they were unaware that diver contacts with the reef were being specifically recorded. Green Fins environmental assessments and diver observations were conducted simultaneously.

Dive guides and guest divers from 44 dive operators participating in the Green Fins programme were followed

Diver characteristics with potential to influence underwater behaviour were categorised as the following factors: diver qualification level (three levels), dive experience (five levels), and previous number of dives at site (three levels).

Divers were assigned a unique diver number, and then followed and observed underwater for the entire duration of their dive.

If the overall group was very large such that the dive guide could not be seen from the rear of the group, the pair immediately behind the dive guide was selected.

Compliance with the Green Fins approach was determined by utilising diver contact rates and dive guide intervention rates as at the dependent variables of interest, and by defining dive operators according to those who had received a high score (above the median score) versus those with a low score (below the median score) on the most recent conducted Green Fins assessment

The part of the body or item of equipment making contact with the reef was recorded as follows: hand, fin, knee, camera, muck stick (a handheld stainless steel or aluminium rod approximately 30 cm in length) and equipment (e.g. tank, submersible pressure gauges, octopus regulator), and multiple (parts of the body and equipment simultaneously). The time during the dive at which the contact occurred was also recorded.

If observable damage (i.e. breakage, obvious physical damage, or injury) occurred as a result of the contact this was recorded, together with the apparent awareness of the diver to the contact, regardless of damage caused.

Interventions were defined as an event in which the dive guide intervened in diver behaviour through signalling or demonstrating correct behaviour in order to minimise or prevent contact with the reef.

A total of 100 SCUBA divers were observed at three diving locations within the Philippines (Table 1). The majority (72 %) of these divers were male, and diving experience ranged from those completing diving training to those who were instructors elsewhere with experience of hundreds of dives.

Following dive completion, divers that had been observed underwater were asked to complete a survey to determine diver characteristics.

Most contacts were made with fins (45.5 %, n = 261); however, hands (19.5 %, n = 112) and dive equipment (15.9 %, n = 91) were also major contributors to the total number of contacts

Contacts made with a camera (77.7 %) accounted for the highest proportion of contacts which resulted in damage, followed by contacts made with the knee (43.3 %), multiple body and equipment parts (38.2 %), equipment (30.7 %), fins (29.8 %), hands (24.7 %), and muck sticks (23.5 %).

A total of 81 interventions were observed (in comparison to 573 reef contacts—see Fig. 4 for the distribution of contacts and interventions);

Camera systems were carried by 55 % of divers; camera-wielding divers accounted for 52.7 % of the total contacts made with the reef. Of divers who utilised a camera, 35 % carried a non-specialist compact type and 20 % carried an SLR type within a specialist underwater housing.

Mean (±SE) dive time was 49.3 ± 0.42 min. A total of 573 diver contacts with the reef were recorded during all assessed dives.

The difference in the frequency of interventions was statistically significant (ANOVA, f = 4.81, P = 0.03)

although a significant portion (36 %) appeared unaware of the contact they made with the reef.

In addition to overall contact levels, some studies have also quantified reef contacts either as the mean number of contacts per diver over the duration of a dive or the diver contact rate per minute of dive time. The mean contact rates of 5.7 contacts per dive, or 0.12 contacts per min, which we observed at dive sites in the Philippines are lower than those previously reported

All divers observed within the present study were diving with operators participating to various degrees in the Green Fins environmentally responsible diving programme.

Identifying factors and policy measures which influence SCUBA diver behaviour underwater can help coral reef managers determine where to most effectively focus effort and funding with respect to dive management. In this study, we found that 88 % of the divers observed made at least one contact with the reef at some point

Divers who are more conservation aware and who contact the reef less may preferentially choose to dive with environmentally ‘accredited’ dive operators; indeed, this assumption partially drives dive operator participation in such programmes.

Underwater interventions by dive guides have been suggested to be the most successful deterrent to diver contact with reefs (Barker and Roberts 2004). In this study, there was no significant difference in the intervention rates between dive centres of high and low Green Fins compliance. Therefore, we cannot attribute the observed difference in diver reef contact rates to differences in intervention rates between these two groups.

Studies examining the effect of carrying camera equipment on the frequency of diver contacts with the reef have produced conflicting results.

Additionally, the administration of a pre-dive briefing can influence diver contact rates underwater (Medio et al. 1997). The Green Fins programme incorporates the use of a pre-dive briefing that emphasises the importance of refraining from contacting the reef, which would be expected to result in lower diver contact rates.

A concern amongst representatives of the diving industry is the use of muck sticks to manipulate animals unnecessarily—pushing animals out of holes for better viewing, stressing animals to show customers their stress behaviour (e.g. an octopus changing colour), and physically breaking hard coral to be used in photographs.

When examining the part of the body or dive equipment which made contact with the reef, we found that the majority of contacts were made with fins, in agreement with Krieger and Chadwick (2013) and Rouphael and Inglis (1998).

It has previously been noted that dive guides customarily perform different roles at dive locations globally; at some locations, they act primarily to lead the dive group around the reef, whilst at others, pairing with and closely supervising individual divers throughout the course of a dive

this suggests that dive guides carry out the closest supervision during the initial phase of the dive and then switch to a ‘dive leader’ role at the front of a dive group.

This study provides evidence that the effective implementation of environmentally responsible practices, via programmes designed to reduce diving impacts, may translate to reduced diver reef contacts.

Many diver characteristics which might intuitively be expected to impact reef contact rates, such as level of qualification and overall experience, were not significant influencing factors in this study, and high versus low levels of Green Fins compliance did not influence the number of interventions made by dive guides underwater.

For continued economic benefit and conservation of Philippine reef dive locations, we recommend that management measures facilitate high levels of compliance with environmentally responsible diving programmes to reduce the impact of diving on coral reefs.

The use of the internet has changed the hospitality industry by helping organize, promote and market tourism products and services, as well as helping communication, online transaction, and distribution systems for hoteliers and consumers

With the growing number of hotels in Indonesia, the number of online websites which offer hotel rooms also increases.

this study examines the process of online hotel decision making by focusing on the effect of website quality on the customers’ e-Trust.

The two key issues we wish to examine are: (1) whether customer’s perception of the website’s usability influenced e-Trust; and (2) whether customer’s perception of the website’s ease of use influenced their e-Trust.

Nowadays there are more travellers than ever that search the internet medium for information of the tourist destination and the process of booking the trip, as evidenced by the increase of information access through the search engine and social media and also online hotel booking

A hotel’s website is not only an information channel but also a trading form, where it not only provides news and data, creates a brand image but also works

as a sale tool. But this ease does not come without a weakness. Communication by the internet creates uncertainty and risks have become an intrinsic attribute of e-commerce from them complexity and anonymity of online purchase.

A good website must be easy to use, understandable, and navigate well (Aziz, 2014). The easiness of using the website’s features can influence the customer’s interest in using the online service and push their booking intention

Because OTAs are such an important channel for hotel distribution, the industry should pay close attention to the way hotels are presented on OTA web pages.

The effect of usability of the website and ease of use of the website on e-Trust among participants of this research is elaborated upon in Table 1. The data in this table display the outcomes of a multiple linear regression analysis.

website quality becomes the main factor in e-commerce because the perception of the website quality will trigger the customers’ purchase intention directly.

The ZEN Rooms website effectively delivers information and adopted a good interaction design to make sure consumers can easily navigate the website and find useful information.

Usability refers to whether a hotel’ s website can provide sufficient information about the product and the service, while ease of use showed the level of which a hotel’s website is easy to navigate and customer-friendly.

e-Trust is the consumer’s trust or confidence that the seller will not abuse the consumer’s vulnerability .

Sparks and Browning (2011) found that consumers depended on the easiness of information processing while evaluating a hotel based on online reviews.

risk-taking behaviour based on consumer’s positive expectations of a hotel’s website was called e-Trust. E-Trust plays an important role in online booking because of the risk that comes with online service

A hotel’s website that has good usability has a significant result on the consumer’s e-Trust. This finding is in line with previous study from Bai et al. (2008) and Wang et al. (2015) which also stated the significant impact between the usability variable towards online booking intention, where the higher a website’s usability was, it automatically affected customer’s e-Trust and willingness to make an online hotel booking.

The level of usability of a website will determine whether a user will stay or leave to find another website

The other variable in this study, which is the ease of use, did not have any significant result on consumer’s e-Trust. This finding is different from previous studies conducted by Shen and Chiou (2010) and Venkatesh and Agarwal (2006) which stated that a website’s ease of use could help consumer’s online booking intention.

There is no significant impact between genders and e-Trust. The findings of this research propose that gender does not play a significant role in the attention of guests toward e-Trust and both genders are highly confident of having online booking purchase of hotel rooms.

The current study is not without limitation, such as the scope of the research. Future studies could conduct similar research but through a mobile application instead of the website. The internet keeps developing and there are changing platforms from website to mobile application so the use of mobile in the hotel industry is unsurprising and expected

The importance of having information towards the relationship between a website’s usability and consumer’s e-Trust is essential to help maintain the attributes of a website’s quality to keep consumer’s e-Trust of the hotel.

digitalization of hotels also includes introduction of advanced solutions for analytics and security.

Digital security systems can not only track the slightest disturbance of the public peace, but also provide additional information.

At present day, it is too early to assess the effectiveness of some recent innovations, that are related mostly to the hotel's image and attract customers.

The main trends in the use of modern technologies in hospitality industry in the conditions of digitalization of the economy are presented in figure 1.

The main disadvantages of traditional technologies include the following: local server requires regular maintenance from the system administrator; access to database is restricted by local network facilities; connection speed is limited by the speed of a local provider and divided among all who are drawn to the sever database

Artificial intelligence plays an equally important role in improving the efficiency of public catering enterprises.

Use of artificial intelligence also allows to analyze the work of the restaurant, and to detect violations of rules by the staff via control of bills, number of the discount card uses, as well as the number of cancellations and deletions of checks.

The issue of privacy that characterizes traditional tourism industry is also addressed through blockchain technology, minimizing exposure to sensitive data in the face of existing problems with cyber attacks and fraud in traditional financial services.

if the concept of hospitality industry enterprise changes, it is possible to change the composition of paid licenses.

Almost all companies in hospitality industry have started to think about using chatbots to solve specific business problems [9].

One of the ways to get competitive advantages for accommodation facilities is to invest and use new technologies. In this regard, augmented reality is the most promising technology for the modern tourism industry. its development and application can increase the competitiveness of destinations.

Augmented reality can be used to interact with guests before, during, and after their stay.

Augmented reality technologies can be used to stimulate travel purchases (the effect of being present in a hotel room, as well as demonstrating the environment and local services using a virtual reality headset). Also, virtual and augmented reality, including those with tactile sensations, can be implemented by digital concierges to issue recommendations to the client on various issues and types of recreation

The API allows one hotel technology system to automatically (i.e., without the participation of hotel employees) interact with another technology system and gain access to its functionality.

The largest companies develop APIs for clients or internal use at some stage.

The result of the analysis of cash transactions is a regular analysis and detailing of violations, categorization of violations, development of measures to counter violations, training of personnel [13].

With the help of speech Analytics tools, specialists can work with 100% of requests. To do this, all dialogues are translated into text and analyzed using a special system.

Based on this analysis, you can develop a change program for existing procedures and processes and optimize self-service systems (personal account, website).

The result of the introduction of innovative speech analytics technologies will be an increase in sales efficiency, an increase in loyalty and customer satisfaction, a reduction in service costs without loss of quality, and behavioral analytics.

Currently, biometrics can already be used to identify and confirm the client's identity. Face scanning technologies when registering with the service.

Analysts predict that the international market for biometric solutions for the hotel sector will grow exponentially in the coming years. Biometrics, as the most reliable and accurate authentication system, can provide real-time information about employees and their use of their working time.

The result of using this technology is payment without wallets and Bank cards, increasing the speed of customer service, and a high level of security.

In 2018, Amazon presented a special version of the voice assistant for hotels — Alexa for Hospitality, which is currently being tested in Marriott hotels.

At the same time, the use of Echo speakers in hotels raises concerns about the privacy of personal data. Amazon claims that audio recordings of the guest's voice commands will be deleted every day, and the hotel administration will not have access to both request records and response records.

IT outsourcing is the transfer to a third-party contractor (outsourcer) of all or part of the functions for servicing the organization's information needs. Currently, this technology is becoming increasingly common in the hospitality industry.

The main point of switching to outsourcing is to optimize the company's costs while significantly improving the quality of services provided. The main criteria for outsourcing are the lack of competitive advantages and not the strategic position of this operation or function for the company

The main problems of implementing information technologies in the hospitality and tourism industry include the high cost of these developments, the duration of staff training processes, and the adaptation of the built system of business processes of enterprises.

The problem is also the difficulty of attracting investment in the hotel business

Another problem with the introduction of information technology in the hotel business is the lack of relevance of regulatory documents and legal barriers to the introduction of innovations

In addition, the introduction of modern information technologies in the hospitality industry is complicated by the level of technical and technological complexity of implementation projects.

nformation technologies are improving at a rapid pace

In the leading Russian hotels that are part of the global hotel chains, the work is fully automated, technological, and has its own computer and Internet services. Such hotels already have a successful experience in implementing modern information technologies.

Customers of the hospitality industry already have a lot of experience in using mobile devices.

Digital marketing is becoming a key channel of communication between the hotel and the network. At the same time, only the implementation of continuous data collection, processing, analysis and aggregation tasks will allow the management of hospitality enterprises to achieve one of their main goals - to better understand their customers and interact with them.

The LAC method [12,13], the carrying capacity [2,4,8,10,14–18], tourism sustainability indicators [8,10,19], or visitor management models [2,4,11] are some of the theoretical concepts and methods which the protected area visitor management may use to assess the effects of tourism and tourism infrastructure construction and maintenance.

isitor counts can be used to form a model reflecting the dynamics of the destination system, allowing visitor flow simulations

However, the quality of such models is critically dependent on the extent, quality, and readiness of the entry data [21]. The use of real-time data in models of destination systems is not common

Individual tracking methods are based on satellite positioning (e.g., The Global Positioning System known as GPS, or Galileo), active mobile positioning, Bluetooth positioning, Wi-Fi positioning, or indirect monitoring based on geocoded social media, or photo databases

Visitor management of a protected area requires tourism impact estimates depending on its intensity (step 1). Estimates of proportions of various visitor categories depending on days of the week, holidays, weather, or season, or other factors together with expert estimates of specific impacts of these categories of visitors are available

The use of visitor monitoring methods is a common part of visitor management practice, however, monitoring is often not implemented

systematically enough and data is often available with a significant delay (for example, from oine people counters installed in the terrain or when using data from mobile operators), making the assessment of the destination system state in real-time impossible

Correct and ecient data integration requires a systematic and consistent approach. However, a relevant methodology for the utilization of heterogeneous data is not available, which may be one of the reasons why comprehensive visitor monitoring is so rare.

the universally applicable concept of an intelligent tour guide for visitor tracking and for visitor characteristics acquisition are introduced in the results section of the manuscript. The ongoing experimental implementation of the proposed concept is mentioned, and relevant challenges are discussed at the end.

Gradually, five representatives and experts from protected area management, six destination organization experts, and four geopark experts were involved. None of the protected area experts involved in the research had any previous experience with systematic visitor data integration or with using the concept of the intelligent software tour guide.

The brainstorming and focus group were used to raise new ideas, and the Delphi method was used to reach a consensus when needed.

The knowledge gathered from experts served as an input for systems analysis, leading to the design of a computer program—an intelligent tour guide for each involved protected area. Namely, use cases, functional requirements, and other characteristics of the software were identified and discussed.

Because meaningful visitor flow and visitor impact modelling require suciently comprehensive and accurate data [21], systematic exploitation of all available relevant heterogeneous data about visitors (collected by a variety of methods, each with its specific limitations, e.g., visitor profiles, numbers of sold tickets, counts from sensors, space-time curves of individual visitors) is a recommended [36] and cost-e ective approach.

Thus, attention should be paid to the categorization of visitors, including their needs, motivations, limitations, and the resulting patterns of behavior. Such analysis may help to reveal which categories of visitors are desired, e.g., because of their positive impact on the local economy, and which should rather be discouraged from coming

The concept is meant to be generic enough to fit a variety of geographic areas (size, protected features of the local nature, local community , tourism intensity , division of roles in participative management between organizations, etc.)

The intelligent tour guide has to be:

Reliable, accessible, compatible.

Personalized.

Location-sensitive.

Destination-system-aware.