Improving e-business customer relationship management systems with multilevel secure data models

Customer relationship management (CRM) leverages technology to coordinate business-customer interactions with the objective of building long-term loyalty. Multilevel secure (MLS) data models were originally developed as database models for the management of information in environments with a strict hierarchy of security levels, such as military institutions and government security agencies. The paper demonstrates how an MLS model can be used to address the issue of sharing and managing customer-related information in e-businesses with diverse constituencies. The potential for exploiting the advantages offered by the MLS models in the e-business CRM context is examined. Several examples are used to show how organizing a database management system based on MLS principles can be used to help e-businesses to provide consistent and appropriate content to various customers and partners in a more efficient manner.