Handling product returns has become a critical activity for organizations as the volume of gods flowing back through the supply chain rapidly increases. Few research studies have published specific empirical data concerning the reverse logistics practices of companies. Information technology and information support has long been recognized as a competitive weapon – capable of enhancing company performance and achieving efficient reverse logistics. Reverse logistics is very unlike the forward, as it is more reactive and also has less visibility. Unlike forward logistics, incoming products from reverse logistics are not tracked broadly because of the lack of information systems resources necessary.The investigated apparel company in this study is operating on the global market and expands their sales twenty per cent each year, resulting in increased pressure in the return flow. To meet this future demands, the return process has to be more efficient and not so time consuming. This study emerged from a case study made at the return department of this apparel company based on a research question. An improvement area was discovered through interviews, internal documents and observations. This area was investigated in existing theories through books and scientific research papers. From the theories and the case study, a hypothesis was created in order to be tested. To strengthen the hypothesis, an experiment was developed and performed at selected retailers and at the apparel company.Research Question Where in the product return process can improvements be made in order to make the information flow more efficient between retailers and an apparel company?HypothesisBy creating a web-based return form, the information flow between retailers and an apparel company will be more efficient, resulting in a more effective and structured product return process.Through the experiment, various factors that strengthen the hypothesis were discovered. For instance, the information flow becomes more effective when retailers have clear guidelines how to send back products and when inserting the information into the computer system before returning. As the apparel company knows what is coming back, the disposition of returned products can be predetermined which will speed up the return process. Shared and available information across various parties facilitate the daily work with better communication. Furthermore, activities that are existing today within the return process can be eliminated which result in more effective product return process. Refund for retailers can be made quicker which result in more satisfied retailers and creates stronger relationships. / Program: Master programme in Applied Textile Management

A Assistência Farmacêutica (AF) é um conceito de prática profissional onde o usuário que precisa do medicamento é o mais importante beneficiário das ações do farmacêutico e dos demais profissionais de saúde que atendem este serviço, ou seja, o usuário é o centro da atenção destes profissionais. Ela, entretanto, não pode ser visualizada apenas pela função de dispensar medicamentos, mas sim como um serviço que complementa as ações em saúde, com um enfoque amplo, incorpora a multidisciplinaridade e a integralidade. O sucesso deste processo depende da participação das diferentes classes de profissionais da saúde, além dos usuários. Este trabalho tem como objetivo analisar os papéis, as formas de comunicação e os fluxos de informação que influenciam nas operações multiprofissionais de atendimento ao usuário na Assistência Farmacêutica. Para tanto, foi escolhido o município de Arroio do Tigre/RS onde foram entrevistados os médicos, enfermeiros, técnicos de enfermagem, farmacêuticos, agentes de saúde, dentistas, psicólogos e assistentes sociais envolvidos na rede multiprofissional de Assistência Farmacêutica do município. Os dados obtidos nas entrevistas foram analisados qualitativamente, com o apoio de planilhas no software Excel para identificação de padrões entre os respondentes. Os fluxos de comunicação/informação foram analisados com o auxílio da ferramenta de análise de redes sociais, o NodeXL. O estudo permitiu observar que há uma necessidade de melhoria da comunicação e do fluxo de informação existente entre os profissionais além de um aumento da clareza do conceito do sistema entre os envolvidos na rede de atendimento ao usuário, esclarecendo as responsabilidades e papéis de cada um dentro da rede para uma gestão de atendimento na AF mais eficaz. / The Pharmaceutical Services consists of a set of people with different relations among them, exchanging lots of information on a daily basis. Thus, it cannot be seen as just a function of dispensing drugs, but as a resource complementing healthcare actions, with a wide approach that incorporates a multidisciplinary and integrality. The success of this process depends on the participation of different classes of healthcare professionals, besides users. The aim of this paper is to study the roles, the forms of communication and information flows that influence multidisciplinary operations of service to users in Pharmaceutical Services. Therefore, the city of Arroio do Tigre/RS was chosen and interviews occurred with professionals such as doctors, nurses, nursing technicians, pharmacists, health workers, dentists, psychologists and social workers involved in the city’s Pharmaceutical Services multidisciplinary network. The data obtained from the interviews were qualitatively analyzed, with the support of Microsoft Excel’s spreadsheets for the identification of patterns among the interviewed. The communication/information flows were analyzed with the aid of NodeXL, a social network analysis tool. The study concluded that there is a need of communication and information flow improvement as well as a more clarity regarding the system concept among the professionals involved in the user service network, clarifying the accountabilities and roles of each one inserted in the network for a more effective drug management.

Falun Gong protesters, the bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade, the spy plane incident and a series of mine accidents are just some of the events over the past decade that involved the Internet. In each incident the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was caught off guard by the circumvention of informational flows as a consequence of the Internet. This is in some ways indicative of the impact the medium is having on the ability of the CCP to manage political discourse within the confines of the country. This thesis examines the way that political discourse in contemporary China is managed in response to the development of the Internet, using the concepts of time and space as conceived by Harold A. Innis. This historical study considers the strategies used in the management of time and space in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) across a broad range of ways in which the medium is used by particular groups, such as online gamers, bloggers, hackers, and activists. I have also looked at the way information flows are managed during a crisis or disaster using critical textual analysis of Internet sources, and specific examples. These sources are both official and unofficial including Chinese government sites, journalistic sources both Chinese and Western and Chinese legal databases that appear on the World Wide Web (WWW). The study finds that there is an emerging shift from propaganda based media manipulation and suppression to a style of stage managed spin. The CCP have used three strategies to contain and maintain their hold over central power, including the rule of law, investment in the development of content and technological means. The development of the Internet in China is marked by a dialect of desire for the technology for economic purposes and the perceived need to control the technology for political purposes. The Internet has also enabled the central government in Beijing to reassert its position as a central authority over local and provincial governments. This study contributes to the existing knowledge about Chinese media policy and the Internet, and will shed light on the ways in which the tehcnology influences the production and consumption of media and the impact that the development of this medium has upon media policy in China. Furthermore, this study will contribute to a greater understanding of CCP's ability to manage information and the impact that this medium will have on the operations of Chinese politics within the space of the Internet, as well as the impact of the technology on politics, and China's interaction with the international community.

As we dive into the digital era, there is growing concern about the amount of personal digital information that is being gathered about us. Websites often track people's browsing behavior, health care insurers gather medical data, and many smartphones and navigation systems store or trans- mit information that makes it possible to track the physical location of their users at any time. Hence, anonymity, and privacy in general, are in- creasingly at stake. Anonymity protocols counter this concern by offering anonymous communication over the Internet. To ensure the correctness of such protocols, which are often extremely complex, a rigorous framework is needed in which anonymity properties can be expressed, analyzed, and ulti- mately verified. Formal methods provide a set of mathematical techniques that allow us to rigorously specify and verify anonymity properties. This thesis addresses the foundational aspects of formal methods for applications in security and in particular in anonymity. More concretely, we develop frameworks for the specification of anonymity properties and propose algorithms for their verification. Since in practice anonymity pro- tocols always leak some information, we focus on quantitative properties which capture the amount of information leaked by a protocol. We start our research on anonymity from its very foundations, namely conditional probabilities - these are the key ingredient of most quantitative anonymity properties. In Chapter 2 we present cpCTL, the first temporal logic making it possible to specify conditional probabilities. In addition, we present an algorithm to verify cpCTL formulas in a model-checking fashion. This logic, together with the model-checker, allows us to specify and verify quantitative anonymity properties over complex systems where probabilistic and nondeterministic behavior may coexist. We then turn our attention to more practical grounds: the constructions of algorithms to compute information leakage. More precisely, in Chapter 3 we present polynomial algorithms to compute the (information-theoretic) leakage of several kinds of fully probabilistic protocols (i.e. protocols with- out nondeterministic behavior). The techniques presented in this chapter are the first ones enabling the computation of (information-theoretic) leak- age in interactive protocols. In Chapter 4 we attack a well known problem in distributed anonymity protocols, namely full-information scheduling. To overcome this problem, we propose an alternative definition of schedulers together with several new definitions of anonymity (varying according to the attacker's power), and revise the famous definition of strong-anonymity from the literature. Furthermore, we provide a technique to verify that a distributed protocol satisfies some of the proposed definitions. In Chapter 5 we provide (counterexample-based) techniques to debug complex systems, allowing for the detection of flaws in security protocols. Finally, in Chapter 6 we briefly discuss extensions to the frameworks and techniques proposed in Chapters 3 and 4.

In this thesis, we considered different approaches for quantifying information hiding in communication protocols.

The present thesis is aimed at analyzing the concept of quality and at dis-cussing, in a unified manner, its role not only in operations management but also in strategic thinking. It criticizes the widespread view that quality is meeting the client’s needs and expectations in such a way that the gap between perceptions and expectations is minimized. Essentially it develops a systematic proposal in order to understand the concept on the intui-tive basis that quality is tantamount to how well something works for a given purpose. The analysis is based on the fact that anytime that the quality concept is used there are actors that carry out an action with the help of a means—thus quality is a particular sort of means-ends fitness. Roughly speaking, the quality of a means is its capability to improve the expected conse-quences of the action. The analysis shows under which conditions this conclusion can be understood in terms of multi-attribute preference orderings under uncertainty—some ideas from decision theory, which are required in order to do that, are presented. In short, whether the expected consequences improve or not depends on an assumed preference ordering that has to be correct given the actors’ circumstances and purposes—but it may be distinct from the actual preferences of many individual actors. Quality is neither subjective (it does not change depending on the psychological processes of any particular individual) nor objective (in a sense, it depends on action and cognition), but it is relative to a given set of reference preferences. Some conditions apply to what it counts as a means, how it relates to an end, which attributes are relevant to assess consequences, or which reference preferences are well-formed. In particular, I discuss to which kind of means the concept is properly applied. As a complement, a basic model of means-ends relationships (built on several properties of Boolean functions) is presented. At a slightly more technical level, it shows relevant insights, but strictly speaking it is not required in order to understand the rest of the thesis. Quality appears in management under two interrelated forms: (a) or-ganizations’ interventions in the quality of what they use and provide and (b) organizations’ initiatives to compete through quality. (a) The basic structure behind quality management is examined under the lens of the quality concept’s analysis. The following issues are dis-cussed: setting quality criteria, product design, process design, onsite planning, onsite control, standardization, product improvement, process improvement and rethinking reference preferences. (b) The role of quality on competitive advantage and sustainable profit-ability depends on how quality relates to entry barriers. I show different ways in which quality can interact (if it does) with product differentiation, experience effects, scope economies, reputation, capital requirements, access to distribution channels, switching costs, legal barriers or scale economies. The strength of quality as a driver of profitability is dis-cussed—the conclusion is that it is not easy to build sustainable competitive advantages on the basis of quality alone and that its complementary role in competition has several aspects that are needed to be taken into account. Finally, the particular example of how the quality concept works in re-lation to information flows is treated in some detail. Information flows are processes that move information from the firm’s inner or outer environ-ment to actions. Decisive factors of its quality (basically, information asymmetries and coherence) are discussed. Two actual case studies are presented. The example of information flows is aimed at showing the mo-tivation for a general analysis of the quality concept beyond sloganlike statements about clients, products, perceptions and expectations. / La tesis tiene como objetivo analizar el concepto de calidad y discutir de forma unificada su papel tanto en la dirección de operaciones como en el pensamiento estratégico. El trabajo argumenta en contra de la opinión generalizada de que la calidad es satisfacer las necesidades y expectativas del cliente de tal manera que la diferencia entre percepciones y expectativas se reduzca. Se desarrolla una propuesta sistemática con el fin de entender el concepto sobre la base intuitiva de que la calidad se relaciona con lo bien que funcionan las cosas para un fin determinado. El análisis se basa en el hecho de que cualquier uso del concepto de calidad supone que hay actores que realizan una acción con la ayuda de un medio. En consecuencia, la calidad es un tipo particular de relación entre medios y fines. En términos generales, la calidad de un medio es su capacidad para mejorar las consecuencias esperadas de la acción. El análisis muestra cómo ésta conclusión puede entenderse en términos de preferencias multiatributo bajo condiciones de incertidumbre. Que las consecuencias sean mejores o no depende de suponer una relación de preferencias que debe ser correcta dados los propósitos y circunstancias de los actores, pero que puede ser distinta de las preferencias reales de muchos actores individuales. La calidad no es subjetiva (no cambia en función de los procesos psicológicos de un individuo en particular) ni objetiva (en cierto sentido, depende de la acción y la cognición), sino que es relativa a ciertas preferencias de referencia. En la tesis se estudia qué se considera un medio, cómo se relaciona con un fin, qué atributos son relevantes, cuándo las preferencias de referencia están bien formadas, y a qué tipo de medios tiene sentido aplicar el concepto. Como complemento, se presenta un modelo simple (construido a partir de propiedades de las funciones booleanas) sobre relaciones medios-fines. El concepto de calidad aparece en la gestión bajo dos formas interrelacionadas: (a) las actividades de las organizaciones para intervenir en la calidad de lo que utilizan y proporcionan, y (b) las iniciativas para competir a través de la calidad. (a) Las actividades básicas de la gestión de la calidad se examinan bajo la perspectiva del análisis del concepto: definición de criterios de calidad, diseño de productos, diseño de procesos, planificación operativa, control, estandarización, mejora del producto, mejora de procesos, y redefinición de las preferencias de referencia. (b) El papel de la calidad en la rentabilidad y la ventaja competitiva sostenibles depende de cómo la calidad se relaciona con las barreras de entrada. El trabajo trata diferentes formas en que la calidad puede interactuar con la diferenciación del producto, los efectos de aprendizaje, las economías de alcance, la reputación, los requisitos de capital, el acceso a canales de distribución, los efectos red, las barreras legales o las economías de escala. Se argumenta que no es fácil de construir ventajas competitivas sostenibles solamente sobre la base de la calidad; su papel complementario en otras estrategias competitivas tiene varios aspectos a considerar. Por último, se trata el ejemplo concreto de la calidad de los flujos de información (procesos que mueven información desde el entorno hasta las decisiones para modificarlo). Se estudian, y se ilustran mediante dos casos reales, los factores decisivos de su calidad: la coherencia y las asimetrías en la información. El ejemplo de la información tiene por objetivo mostrar la necesidad de un análisis del concepto de calidad más allá de exhortaciones sobre clientes, productos, percepciones y expectativas. / L’objectiu de la tesi és analitzar el concepte de qualitat i discutir de forma unificada el seu paper tant en la direcció d'operacions com en el pensament estratègic. El treball argumenta en contra de l'opinió generalitzada de que la qualitat consisteix en satisfer les necessitats i expectatives del client de manera que la diferència entre percepcions i expectatives es redueixi. Es desenvolupa una proposta sistemàtica per tal d'entendre el concepte sobre la base intuïtiva de que la qualitat es relaciona amb com de bé funcionen les coses per una finalitat determinada. L'anàlisi es basa en el fet que qualsevol ús del concepte de qualitat suposa que hi ha actors que realitzen una acció amb l'ajuda d'un mitjà. En conseqüència, la qualitat és un tipus particular de relació entre mitjans i fins. En termes generals, la qualitat d'un mitjà és la seva capacitat per millorar les conseqüències esperades de l'acció. L'anàlisi mostra com aquesta conclusió es pot entendre en termes de preferències multiatribut sota condicions d'incertesa. Que les conseqüències siguin millors o no depèn de suposar una relació de preferències que ha de ser correcta donats els propòsits i circumstàncies dels actors, però que pot ser diferent de les preferències reals de molts actors individuals. La qualitat no és subjectiva (no canvia en funció dels processos psicològics d'un individu en particular) ni objectiva (en certa manera, depèn de l'acció i la cognició), sinó que és relativa a certes preferències de referència. En la tesi s'estudia què es considera un mitjà, com es relaciona amb un fi, quins atributs són rellevants, quan les preferències de referència estan ben formades, i a quin tipus de mitjans té sentit aplicar el concepte. Com a complement, es presenta un model simple (construït a partir de propietats de les funcions booleanes) sobre les relacions entre mitjans i fins. El concepte de qualitat apareix en la gestió sota dues formes interrelacionades: (a) les activitats de les organitzacions per intervenir en la qualitat d’allò que fan servir i proporcionen, i (b) les iniciatives per competir a través de la qualitat. (a) Les activitats bàsiques de la gestió de la qualitat s'examinen sota la perspectiva de l'anàlisi del concepte: definició de criteris de qualitat, disseny de productes, disseny de processos, planificació operativa, control, estandardització, millora del producte, millora de processos , i redefinició de les preferències de referència. (b) El paper de la qualitat en la rendibilitat i l'avantatge competitiu sostenibles depèn de com la qualitat es relaciona amb les barreres d'entrada. El treball tracta diferents formes en les que la qualitat pot interactuar amb la diferenciació del producte, els efectes d'aprenentatge, les economies d'abast, la reputació, els requisits de capital, l'accés a canals de distribució, els efectes xarxa, les barreres legals o les economies d'escala. S'argumenta que no és fàcil construir avantatges competitius sostenibles només sobre la base de la qualitat; el seu paper complementari en altres estratègies competitives té diversos aspectes a considerar. Finalment, es tracta l'exemple concret de la qualitat dels fluxos d'informació (processos que mouen informació des de l'entorn fins a les decisions per modificar). S'estudien, i s'il•lustren mitjançant dos casos reals, els factors decisius de la seva qualitat: la coherència i les asimetries en la informació. L'exemple de la informació té per objectiu mostrar la necessitat d'una anàlisi del concepte de qualitat més enllà d’exhortacions sobre clients, productes, percepcions i expectatives.

In todays competitive business climate the concept of “quality management” is a significant part of daily work for many companies, as they want to achieve high performance quality and delivery success. Within the services sector third-party logistics companies play an increasingly central role when it comes to the goods that are being transported. These companies are presented with continuous challenges to ensure that goods are loaded on trucks efficiently and delivered on time, at the right place and in the right condition. The present case study was conducted in collaboration with Schenker AB and Schenker Åkeri in Jönköping, to help these two company branches serving under the same major corporation to solve a common problem they both encounter, namely the fact that it regularly occurs handling abnormalities in the terminal process that affects overall quality for customers. The study aims to find out how the daily quality control concerning the handling of goods in the terminal process can be improved hopefully resulting in a higher quality in cargo shipments. The aim of the study was approached by trying to answer the following two questions: What are the causes of management deviations in the terminal process and how can these be grouped into different classes? How can quality control be changed to prevent these handling deviations? The approach has consisted of a parallel collection of data and theory in order to continuously relate data and theory to find a coherent context for the problems that these branches are facing. Primary data has been obtained through observations and interviews from both branches. Secondary data was collected through a survey conducted by Schenker Åkeri regarding information flow in the present situation and the desired position of drivers. The results of the inquiry have shown that most of the deviations in the terminal process occur when the operator performs a task incorrectly, also known as handling errors. Furthermore, the study has shown that the information given regarding certain operations has been inadequate and not sufficiently clear, thus this has shown to be one of the reasons that handling errors occur. As a result, the framework for all proposed meetings was prepared with guidelines regarding what the meeting should include for the respective departments, as well as important advice to remember while performing a lean meeting. To correct and avoid handling errors that occur on an operational level, it is recommended the information architecture be improved. Thus, this was elaborated in the form of regular meetings based on the Lean philosophy between labor management level and operational level. Deviations are prevented also by a standardized approach, and visualized and distinct markup for what may be placed at any location. A significant aspect of a company is to create commitment and motivation of all employees at all levels. Collaboration between the two company branches is important when working in close proximity, meaning that the actions of one branch of the company will affect the others, and vice verse. In conclusion, we recommend that the branches work together to create a common vision applied within both Schenker AB and Schenker Åkeri. "Community and collaboration creates quality and customer value!" / I dagsläget är kvalitetsstyrning en betydelsefull del av det dagliga arbetet för många företag då de vill uppnå hög kvalitet och leveranssäkerhet. Inom tjänstesektorn spelar tredjepartslogistikföretag en allt centralare roll vid transport av gods. Dessa företag står för ständiga utmaningar att säkerställa så att godsl astas på transportbilarna och levereras i rätt tid, till rätt plats och i rätt form. Denna fallstudie har genomförts på Schenker AB och Schenker Åkeri i Jönköping. De står inför ett gemensamt problem då det löpande uppstår hanteringsavvikelser i terminalprocessen som påverkar totalkvaliteten för kunderna. Syftet med studien är att ta reda på hur den dagliga kvalitetsstyrningen beträffande godshantering i terminalprocessen kan utvecklas för att leda till en högre kvalitet i styckegodsleveranserna. Syftet har brutits ner till två frågeställningar: Vilka är orsakerna till hanteringsavvikelserna i terminalprocessen och kan dessaindelas i kategorier? Hur kan kvalitetsstyrningen förändras för att förebygga dessa hanteringsavvikelser? Tillvägagångssättet har varit att parallellt samla in data och granska teorier för att kontinuerligt referera dessa med varandra och finna sammanhang. Primärdata har införskaffats via observationer och intervjuer på båda verksamheterna. Sekundärdata har samlats in i form av en enkätundersökning utförd av Schenker Åkeri angående informationsflödet i nuläge och önskat läge bland chaufförerna. Resultatet från undersökningarna har visat att de flesta avvikelserna i terminalprocessen uppstår då operatören utfört arbetsuppgiften på ett felaktigt sätt, även kallat handhavandefel. Vidare har studien visat att informationen inom verksamheterna har varit bristfällig och inte tillräckligt tydlig i vissa fall, vilket därmed konstaterats är en av orsakerna till att handhavandefel uppstår. Ramverk för samtliga föreslagna möten har upprättats med riktlinjer för vad mötet ska innehålla på respektive avdelning samt betydelsefulla råd att tänka på vid ett lean-möte. För att åtgärda handhavandefel som uppstår på en operativ nivå rekommenderas en förbättrad informationsstruktur. Informationsstrukturen har utvecklats med regelbundna möten baserat på Lean-filosofin mellan arbetsledarnivå och operativ nivå. Avvikelser förebyggs också genom ett standardiserat arbetssätt samt visualiserad och distinkt uppmärkning för vad som får placeras på vilken plats. Betydelsefullt för ett företag är att skapa engagemang och motivation hos samtliga medarbetare på alla nivåer. Ett samarbete mellan de båda verksamheterna är också viktigt då de arbetar nära varandra och den enas handling kommer att påverka den andras. I och med detta rekommenderar vi en gemensam vision och motto som bör tillämpas inom Schenker AB och Schenker Åkeri. Det är viktigt att visionen implementeras i hela organisationen och att den efterföljs. ”Gemenskap och samarbete skapar kvalitet och kundvärde!”

A variety of information items related to building components need to be accessed and exchanged between design, manufacturing and construction companies, during various phases of a life-cycle of a component. This information accessing and exchange process is especially important for customized components, such as steel components, because more information items are associated with these customized components. Within the current practice, information about steel components is mainly exchanged on paper-based documents and component location identification is maintained via manual searching methods. It was observed that locating components using these approaches are either time consuming and inaccurate. Furthermore document based information exchange is not efficient. The proposed research focuses on the identified need with the objectives of identifying information items required during design, manufacturing, shipment and installation phases of structural steel members and providing new approach that can enable accessing component specific information and locating components during manufacturing, shipment and installation in a timely manner. This approach benefits from the opportunities provided by RFID technology.

Although modern computer systems process increasing amounts of sensitive, private, and valuable information, most of today’s operating systems (OSs) fail to protect confidential data against unauthorized disclosure over covert channels. Securing the large code bases of these OSs and checking the secured code for the absence of covert channels would come at enormous costs. Microkernels significantly reduce the necessarily trusted code. However, cost-efficient, provable confidential-data protection in microkernel-based systems is still challenging. This thesis makes two central contributions to the provable protection of confidential data against disclosure over covert channels: • A budget-enforcing, fixed-priority scheduler that provably eliminates covert timing channels in open microkernel-based systems; and • A sound control-flow-sensitive security type system for low-level operating-system code. To prevent scheduling-related timing channels, the proposed scheduler treats possibly leaking, blocked threads as if they were runnable. When it selects such a thread, it runs a higher classified budget consumer. A characterization of budget-consumer time as a blocking term makes it possible to reuse a large class of existing admission tests to determine whether the proposed scheduler can meet the real-time guarantees of all threads we envisage to run. Compared to contemporary information-flow-secure schedulers, significantly more real-time threads can be admitted for the proposed scheduler. The role of the proposed security type system is to prove those system components free of security policy violating information flows that simultaneously operate on behalf of differently classified clients. In an open microkernel-based system, these are the microkernel and the necessarily trusted multilevel servers. To reduce the complexity of the security type system, C++ operating-system code is translated into a corresponding Toy program, which in turn is complemented with calls to Toy procedures describing the side effects of interactions with the underlying hardware. Toy is a non-deterministic intermediate programming language, which I have designed specifically for this purpose. A universal lattice for shared-memory programs enables the type system to check the resulting Toy code for potentially harmful information flows, even if the security policy of the system is not known at the time of the analysis. I demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed analysis in three case studies: a virtual-memory access, L4 inter-process communication and a secure buffer cache. In addition, I prove Osvik’s countermeasure effective against AES cache side-channel attacks. To my best knowledge, this is the first security-type-system-based proof of such a countermeasure. The ability of a security type system to tolerate temporary breaches of confidentiality in lock-protected shared-memory regions turned out to be fundamental for this proof.

This dissertation examines the forces that drive organizational structure and boundary decisions. Using theoretical concepts drawn from transaction cost theory and agency theory, this dissertation develops a model that draws attention to behavioral and outcome distinctions in information flow. Specifically it examines how characteristics of these different types of management information alter the organizational design outcomes predicted by the two theory bases above. The foundational arguments regarding firm boundaries and structure are based on the two contracting modes of agency theory, behavioral and outcome. The construct of information localization (IL), defined as theneed to use information within its immediate context (or conversely, the difficulty of transferring and utilizing information outside of its immediate context), is introduced and used to predict organizational design decisions. This construct represents a synthesis of prior conceptions of information characteristics and is used both to capture salient characteristics of management information and to facilitate an examination of the impacts of different information technology (IT) applications. The relationship between information localization and firm boundaries and structure is tested at the task level. The relationship of information technology with boundary and structure decisions is explained using the model and tested concurrently with the test of the information localization hypotheses. A comprehensive model is proposed and propositions to guide future research are developed. The distinction between outcome and behavioral information localization allows a more nuanced assessment of the impacts of information and information technology on the organization of work. The empirical results suggest that the impact of IT on outcome information localization is negligible for tasks with low outcome IL but increases the likelihood of outsourcing for tasks with high outcome IL. Contrary to prior findings utilizing different conceptualizations of information flow, the impact of technology on behavioral IL on autonomy showed that applications of IT may increase autonomy (decentralization of decision-making) rather than decrease it. / text