User:Muhil 19/sandbox

Information and Communication Technology is an extensional term for Information Technology (IT) as ICT stresses and focuses primarily on unified communication that merges Telecommunications and Computers together. ICT has become a huge enhancement of lifestyle in people’s life and also a promising platform for monetisation over the period of time. Unified communication has decreased people’s effort for a living in all aspects and has increased the comfortability for each and every human for their own purposes in various other ways. It has become the most primary and prioritised part of human’s life in this whole world as it increases the interaction with people and information from various parts of the world with just one click, that is very very easier and comfortable than the ideas and practises that existed before these were introduced.

COVID-19(coronavirus) a pandemic situation that has impacted more than 200 countries by claiming lives more than any other pandemic situation in the 21st century. Impact of COVID-19 has not just been limited to human life’s but also on the economy and ICT. The fear of death and protective decisions by the government have had a huge impact on ICT both positively and negatively.

Looking over the positive impact of COVID-19 towards ICT would be that, even though ICT existed all these years since 2009 the percentage of people having knowledge and using these were very less and were mostly present in the Technological sector. As COVID-19 demands self-quarantine and social distancing to prevent virus spread, the preventive decisions by the government to stay alone and in their own houses to stop the spread, it impacted the lifestyle of every human. This is where the ICT kicks in to balance our lives to an extent without total destruction. ICT in this pandemic situation has become one of the most used and helpful support for the whole situation as it helps people in this uninvited and non-forecasted situation by creating communication and technological service without a change in Geographical area and forced the gain of knowledge about ICT for everyone in need as they can’t suit themselves in this situation without the knowledge. This allows the people to do their work without a change in their geographical area which becomes advantageous for the people and economy. Using ICT declines the need for physical presence and still helps them do the work required. It does not only keep the work going on but also acts as an entertainment throughout the world so that no one in self-quarantine and isolation is left lonely and mental stability is maintained as it provides a presence around us with the help of gadgets. Some of the example of ICT used in this pandemic situation would be:

1.Google Classroom - a virtual classroom that acts as a classroom and keeps the education system going on. 2.Google Meet/Zoom - free communication softwares that helps people to present or video conference with others. Used for office meetings, family calls etc… 3.Servers and NAS - technological based services for people in technological sectors helping them to view and access information from different      geographical location 4.Website’s - vast information and dynamic facts, faster than other official channels 5.Social Media - entertainment and information sharing, more effective than the official ways.

Looking in another perspective, the world before this pandemic situation also had a major role in ICT and huge investment compared to other sectors, the preplanned strategies, investments and advancements in the sector of ICT was terribly disturbed and interrupted. As the investments on ICT had an economical advancement as a basic strategy these were all interrupted and added on to the destruction of the economy in this pandemic situation. The major impacts would be: 1.5G 2.Artificial Intelligence 3.Asset Tracking and Management 4.Autonomous Vehicles 5.Big Data Analytics 6.Cloud and Edge Computing 7.Cybersecurity 8.Healthcare Solutions 9.IoT 10.Payments 11.Public Safety 12.Robotics, 13.Smart Cities 14.Social Credit Systems 15.Teleoperations 16.Wearable Technology and other areas such as 17.Digital Transformation initiatives

These major initiatives and advancements in technology were planned long before in time and were interrupted during the implementation phase because of the restrictions of change in geographical locations demanded by the pandemic situation that affects the Supply Chain, Production and Employee attendance that affects the software and hardware of ICT advancements. Employee attendance has affected all the software based services provided in the market and there is a high range of uncomfortability faced by the consumers all over the world.

Health based negativity has been intensifying over this pandemic situation as people are being put into the situation where the lifestyle of theirs is being changed and highly dependent on the devices that basically threaten the health of them in a very minimal way. This minimal health issues created by the devices is increasing eventually as they demand the attention throughout the whole time and have a huge impact on their lives and health than before. Therefore, these are the positive and negative impacts of COVID-19 on Information Communication Technology.