Other factors are however incorporated so as to make use understand the user adoption of the ENUM technology. The users possessing high adoption application of ENUM are to be assumed to be the 'early adopters' and are to be associated with the factors employed in Roger's (1995) theory in characterizing the early adopters. The user adoption of ENUM is effectively hypothesized to be affected/influenced by; (1) the characteristics of the innovation such as the perceived relative advantage, trialability, compatibility, complexity and observability. (2) the communication channels (influence of peers and industry ) (3) the social system (existence of restrictive policy) (4) individual characteristics (how techno savvy the users are ) as well as the general attitude of the users (individuals and telecommunication industry) towards the convenience, cost effectiveness and other advantages of ENUM. Literature review

Innovation is an improved way of doing something. The work of Mohr (1982) stated that every organization must possess as well as be willing to appropriately commit the various resources that are needed to effectively implement a given new technology for these organizations to be successful. Lewin (1951) on the other hand, came up with a three-step sequential model that effectively described how various processes are changed. He pointed out that the present behavior that is 'unfrozen' gets 'changed' in order to reinforce the improved (new) behavior. He suggested that there are various forces that exist in the changing as well as maintaining the nature of the status quo (Stoner, James and Edward, 1989).These are; new technology, improved raw materials, competition from other entities, pressures from supervisors. On the hand, the forces that hinder change are; norms of a certain group's performance fear of change as well as the external threats. The work of Berth (1991) indicated that various organizational members are supposed to identify with a given champion who is mandated with spearheading the change to necessitate the 'unfreezing' process. The work of Cooper and Zmud (1990) defined the implementation of IT ideas as an organizational effort that is directed towards the diffusion of the necessary information technology within a given user community. They came up with a six-staged model for implementing IT-based projects on the basis of the work of Lewin (1951).The is;

1. Initiation: Which involves the active or active scanning of the problems as well as opportunities

2. Adoption: Which involves the negotiation for the backing of the implementation of the IT applications

3. Adaptation: The process of revising the IT applications as well as the organizational procedures

4. Acceptance: The stage where the organizational members are induced to appropriately commit to the given It application.

5. Routinization: Denotes the encouragement for the utilization of the IT application as a normal thing/activity.

6. Infusion: The increasing of the effectiveness that is gained by using the given technology.

There are also five main contextual factors that have an impact on the stages of the adoption process. These are; the user community, the organization, adopted technology and the organizational environment.

The methodology

This study makes use of documents that describes the ENUM trials in the UK, Australia and the U.S. with the need of identifying the key issues that would affect the adoption as well as the diffusion of the technology. The study is longitudinal so as to reveal any contextual factors.

The development of the model

A customized model is employed in order to identify as well as measure the various factors that have an influence on the ENUM innovation. The model used is the one developed by Liu Sheng (1999) as a modification of an earlier model by Cooper and Zmud (1990).

Key Issues that in the adoption of the ENUM system

A review of ENUM trials in USA, UK and Australia indicates a pattern of issues to be addressed. Security issues have been prevalent in ENUM related discussions. Contact information used by ENUM is stored in a public database with unrestricted access. This means ENUM security has been given much priority. Other features of the ENUM database may as well be specific procedures for contacting an individual, such as the gadgets to be utilized by a particular caller as per the time of day.

ENUM may also become a tool for business people, spammers, and other malicious people whose aim is to cause disturbance to others. This was stated by the Electronic Privacy and Information Center (EPIC). ENUM database, having unrestricted access by the public may be used by sales executives, spammers, and cyber criminals to acquire private contact information.

The absence of legal restrictions...

Proposals made by the government and organizations on how to enforce ENUM is one risk factor associated with its destruction. The other factor is the kind of technical strategies to be employed. These solutions will greatly influence the risk height of abuse of personal information.
New Privacy and Security issues emanating from ENUM

There exist two distinctive notions of how ENUM may be applied: the first concept gives the caller the ability to determine the mode of connection, while the second concept lets the person being called to control the call connection.

These two approaches differ significantly in the aspect of privacy. In the first concept, the caller is supplied with all possible contact information leading to the corresponding individual being called and may always select the suitable one to use. As a result, the caller may retain all the details received for future use.In contrast, the second concept allows only one contact detail to be inserted to the DNS record. (Rosenberg et al., 2002).Other concerns emanating from particular applications of ENUM are affected by mismanaged supervision of controls. This can mean that an entity copies another one's identity

Malicious users take advantage of this to expose confidential personal details or use it for certain unlawful purposes. This kind of security should also be put in place for downloads and study of web contentSince it can encompass execution of implanted or linked malware .As a result, the automatically download feature must be turned off on the user application. A number of ENUM services may also be addressed for software that demand some form of security protocol, but do not accord the required mechanisms themselves. For example, in the storage of personal details for support, user passwords can be applied by defining a necessary underpinning ENUM system.

Here, an outer privacy service is needed. Another concern that emanates from the new chances is that malicious service provider personnel put themselves in the call paths of a particular E.164 number, having no permission from the receiver. These security issues may hinder the accelerated adoption of the ENUM technology.

The Roger's adoption model for ENUM

Adopter categories

The Roger's model of adopting an innovation comprises of five adopter categories (Roger,1995). These are the characteristics that can influence the way an individual uses an innovation.ENUM can be regarded as an efficient and cost effective communication technology that is to replace the traditional and the rather conventional telecommunication via multiple devices such as telephone, fax and email. According to the model advanced by Rogers (1995) the adopter category comprises of;

Relative advantage; This is the degree to which the given innovation would be perceived to be better than the one that it supersedes. The relative advantage is made up of various factors. The first relative advantage of ENUM is that it is much more convenient that the currently existing telephone numbers. For example, an individual can have all of their voice mail, emails and fax in a single inbox that bears a single and common number. The second adopter category or advantage is efficiency; ENUM can save one a lot of time and money by using a single number and inbox provided by a single telecommunication provider at a discounted fee. The other advantage is the fact that ENUM has improved quality of data information received. This is There are however certain obstacles such as security and privacy concerns in ENUM implementations. The second characteristic is compatibility of the innovation. ENUM is compatible with the existing internet backbone and the current DNS services. What are needed are certain upgrades in terms of terminal hardware and software. The third characteristic is complexity. ENUM is perceived to be a complex system by certain would-be implementers…