A Study of the Perceived Security Threats of Computerized Accounting Information Systems: The Case of Egyptian Banking Sector

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to investigate the perceived security threats of computerized accounting information systems (CAIS) in developing countries. The entire population of the Egyptian banking sector (EBS) has been surveyed to achieve the purpose of the paper. The differences between the respondents’ opinions as well as bank types regarding the perceived security threats have been identified and investigated in the context of the EBS. The results revealed that accidental entry of bad data by employees, accidental destruction of data by employees, introduction of computer viruses to the system, natural and human-made disasters, employees’ sharing of passwords and misdirecting prints and distributing information to people not entitled to receive them are perceived as the most important security threats to CAIS in the EBS. In all these cases, the heads of internal audit departments reported higher rank of occurrence frequencies of CAIS security threats compared with the heads of computer departments.