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The extraordinary growth of the U.S. economy since the mid-1990s has financial analysts loath to make predictions about the future and grasping for ways to assess and measure the very impetus contributing to the phenomenon-the pervasiveness of information technology. Business and government officials agree that technology has played a significant part in spurring on the sustained period of economic prosperity-from its contribution to manufacturing to its role in consumer purchasing to the impact on the work force. But success brings with it certain challenges. Companies as well as governments, while excited about today's bounty, are scrambling to address those challenges before the bubble bursts.

A set of software and algorithms developed to identify criminal activity in the gambling industry is now available to the federal government to help detect employee fraud and collusion. The system correlates data from a variety of sources to shed light on questionable personal relationships and transactions. In the federal sector, this system's potential uses cover internal security, background investigations and intelligence gathering.

Profound Internet growth and the changes it generates in the economy and society is a double-edged sword. Electronic commerce benefits are fundamentally altering the way people produce, consume and communicate. Yet, risks and vulnerabilities are inherent network byproducts. Growing electronic threats mandate risk management, customer confidence and at least some level of information protection.

The passionate debate about whether to collect sales tax on purchases made over the Internet has politicians, economists and industry searching for the right course of action to continue unprecedented economic growth while supporting the flow of revenue to states or to countries. Experts on both sides of the issue have strong convictions, leaving the legislators with some very hard choices to make during the next several years.

A World Wide Web-based document coordination tool developed for the U.S. Army has become available for the entire federal government. The system enables multiple users to review a directive or regulation posted on a Web or intranet site and enter their comments. The recorded information is then used to modify the document efficiently as it moves toward completion.

Jim Robbins, the Harvard-educated president of one of the nation's largest cable companies, was in southern California on a business trip when he decided to check his voice mail and got the stunning news that America Online had agreed to merge with Time Warner. The deal was not only the largest of its kind but one that promises to reshape how executives in a wide range of telecommunications businesses view the concept of convergence.

The music of the e-commerce overture in Canada is getting louder and increasing in intensity. Even before year 2000 work began winding down, the country's government agencies began fine-tuning their ideas and following the lead of its prime minister in what has already become a global symphony of economic change.

If anyone can explain the principles behind the flight path of a boomerang, it is Dr. Edward H. Bersoff. Not only is Bersoff president, chief executive officer and founder of BTG Incorporated, a leading information technology company based in Fairfax, Virginia, but he also holds a doctoral degree in mathematics from New York University and is a former U.S. Army officer assigned to the National Aeronautics and Space

Technology derived from military signal analysis work is producing testing equipment for wideband applications in the private sector. These devices are capable of both storing and analyzing large amounts of data while generating a variety of broadcast waveforms.

Dealing with the Byzantine operations of the Internal Revenue Service leaves a lot of executives feeling taxed-but not Van B. Honeycutt. Instead, the chairman, president and chief executive officer of Computer Sciences Corporation, El Segundo, California, says his company's lead role in a 10- to 15-year contract to overhaul the federal tax agency's information infrastructure underscores a series of dramatic changes he helped plan 10 years ago. They include more work with Fortune 500 companies and rapid growth through acquisitions.