The Top Technologies list consists of areas destined to have a significant impact on business in the year ahead.

"It should come as no surprise that Information Security is the top issue," said Roman Kepczyk, Chairman of the AICPA Information Technology Executive Committee and Chair of the Top Technologies Task Force. "Information Security always makes a significant showing on the list. We can expect it to be a major issue for the foreseeable future."

The AICPA Top Technologies for 2003 (* indicates an issue that has not previously appeared on the list):

1. Information Security: The hardware, software, processes, and procedures in place to protect an organization's information systems from internal and external threats. They include firewalls, anti-virus, password management, patches, locked facilities, internet-protocol strategy, and perimeter control.
   
   
2. *Business Information Management: The process of capturing, indexing, storing, retrieving, searching, and managing documents electronically, including knowledge and database management (XML, PDF and other formats). Business Information Management brings to fruition the promise of the "paperless office."
   
   
3. *Application Integration: The ability of different operating systems, applications, and databases to "talk" to each other and for information to flow freely regardless of application, language, or platform.
   
   
4. Web Services: Applications that use the Internet as their infrastructure and access tool, including both Web-enabled and Web-based applications. Examples include Java applications, Microsoft's .Net initiative, and today's Application Service Providers (ASP) and business portals.
   
   
5. Disaster Recovery Planning: The development, monitoring, and updating of the process by which organizations plan for continuity of their business in the event of a loss of business information resources due to impairments such as theft, virus infestation, weather damage, accidents, or other malicious destruction.
   
   
6. *Wireless Technologies: The transfer of voice or data from one machine to another via the airwaves without physical connectivity. Examples include cellular, satellite, infrared, Bluetooth, wireless (WiFi), 3G, and 2-way paging.
   
   
7. *Intrusion Detection: Software or hardware solutions that list and track successful and unsuccessful login attempts on a network such as Tripwire. Intrusion detection capabilities are being built into many of today's firewall applications.
   
   
8. Remote Connectivity: Technology that allows a user to connect to a computer from a distant location outside of the office. Examples would include RAS (Remote Access Services), WTS (Windows Terminal Server), Citrix, MangoMind and PCAnywhere.
   
   
9. *Customer Relationship Management: Managing all customer touch points, including Call Center Technologies, E-commerce, Data Warehousing, and all other technologies used to facilitate communications with customers and prospects.
   
   
10. *Privacy: Today, more and more personal information is being collected and converted to digital formats. This information must be protected from unauthorized use by those with access to the data. Privacy is a business issue, as well as a technology issue, because of state, federal and international regulations.

The 2003 survey had the largest participation ever, with 201 members of the AICPA and the Information Technology Alliance voting, including 142 CPAs holding the Institute's Certified Information Technology Professional (CITP) designation. The AICPA conducts the annual Top Technologies survey as a service to the 4,500 CPAs in its Information Technology Membership Section.