Importance of E-Wallet

E-wallet is an online service which allows buyers to have digital transactions with others. It is included to purchase something online and the customer has to deposit money through an e-wallet directly which is connected to the customer’s individual bank (Abd Malik and Syed Annuar, 2019). An e-wallet system usually enables retailers to make mobile transactions easily.

Aim and objective:

• To make transactions easily and fast is the main motto of the e-wallet system.
• To reduce the guard cases, the e-wallet plays an important role.
• To receive some extra benefits from customers is also an objective of e-wallet which can be termed as reward. 

Importance of E-Wallet

To spread ecommerce system in whole world e-wallet always plays an impotent role. Without an e-wallet there will be no chance to have monetary transactions easily. It is also termed as E-purchasing. E-wallets have a great role in daily use like to pay any kind of bill or booking services. There is a need for e–wallet while paying money or in the case of government or commercial purposes e-wallet has easy access to complete the procedure (Hasim et al. 2020). By clicking on a button it helps the owner to have a flexible transaction with the receiver who is able to receive the payment.

E-Wallet and its purpose

A digital wallet app known as an e-wallet, is a mobile application which can make digital payments by using a phone. The demand for an easy way of managing finances and pay online has promoted the formation of this sector in app development. There are various types of mobile wallets available today, which have a capability for transaction processing.

Problems related to industry

E-wallet have to face different challenges while customers use them. As an example, it will be described as the Russian government has banned the use of e-wallet because 10 million people are affected badly and neighboring countries also (Nizam et al. 2018). Regarding the e-wallet issue many people has already been affected by different illegal activities like money laundering, terrorist financing and drug trading. The number of merchants who accept payments from an electronic wallet is determined on the wallet which has been selected. Although more of the consumers use cashless payment methods around the country, there are a large number of merchants  who still does not accept digital wallet in their shop. Besides physical shops, there are also many online retailers still using the conventional payment method by asking customers to input their card details. 

• Research Question 

1. What kind of security does the E-Wallet transaction provide?
2. What are the facilities available for the E-Wallet users? 

• Research Objective

1. To provide the consumers a high-security feature that is used to complete transactions with an e-wallet.
2. To provide high-end cashless transactions without sharing debit or credit card information online or offline to anyone.

Significant study of E-Wallet 

The research framework is a vital part of the research process as it provides the system that enables the research theories. The research framework was built around the correlations between e-wallet adoption as a dependent variable and the independent variables of speed, social influence, and security. In the time of COVID – 19 pandemics, the independent variables are employed as intermediary variables to examine factors affecting e-wallet use among students’-wallet is easy to track the information or make a transaction easily because with the help of pressing new buttons or options a transaction will be completed and the dealer or customer would not go to ATM or any kind of bank transactions (Lim et al. 2019). While using a mobile wallet anybody does not need to put any kind of CVV code or card number. After every transaction all the information is updated on a regular basis in the phone or electronic device.  

E-Wallet and its purpose

Scope of E-Wallet

Consumers now have more digital payment options where businesses and marketers have more opportunity to sell their products and services online. The scope of the study is to look forward to Malaysia with the use of mobile wallets.  Additional constructs that were not present in the original model are proposed and validated in this study. The scope of the study is also elaborated using an e-wallet system. This allows users to make transactions easier and quicker. While purchasing some product online or cash withdrawal from an ATM is much more flexible through a digital wallet (Sugu and Hussain, 2021). By using the biometric data encryption procedure, it allows the user to control the security of the system. 

E-wallet service is accepted in Malaysia from sales perspectives and it is quite popular among different segments. All the e-commerce sites use e-wallet system to perform a secure payment. E-wallet payments provide benefits to both sellers and buyers as it provides real-time support. Moreover, it introduces Malaysia to adopt cashless economy without an extra effort (Karim et al. 2020). Some of the common factors play a significant role in e-wallet payment cycle that has direct impact on business. Promotion, security as well as profit are those important factors that are responsible to make several positive impacts and they also show negative sides.

As per Aransyah et al. (2020), this low-cost technology is widely accepted due to effortless transaction facilities but risks of fraud is quite a problem in Malaysian e-wallet. It is one the preliminary reasons that make barriers in adoption of e-wallet facilities.  Like other payment methods, unknown hacking risks, data theft as well as wallet vulnerabilities issues are quite common in Malaysian e-wallet system. 

Issues of E-Wallet

The e-wallet issues in Malaysia brings an adverse effect in Malaysia especially in business sector. An adoption of e-wallet technology is a quite risk in Malaysia in this pandemic period. Due to fraud risk and vulnerabilities issues associated to the online transaction build a security issue in the payment services (Neoh et al. 2020). Therefore, the users may face security issues as there may be possibilities in sensitive data hijacking problems. 

Regulatory Compliance

The independent variables are nothing but the factors that are responsible to issue in e-wallet adoptions in Malaysia. If the variables are considered according to the priorities, then it will be easier to identify the most useful variables that affect the online transaction issues.

Problems related to industry

Most of the mobile payment program needs to follow the legal agreements and requirements. According to Andrew et al. (2021), it controls both the economic conditions and customer-based protocols. Thus, the existing online transaction system introduces issues for the newly introduced systems like e-wallet issue as more investment is required to grab the new market. In Malaysia, the investment issue is the major problem in adoption of e-wallet service.  

Hypothesis 1(H1): Without a major investment and an appropriate customer regulatory protocol, online transaction issue may occur in e-wallet system in Malaysia. 

Low Perception

Consumers in Malaysia have perception that m-wallets are not a perfect way to perform online transaction. They are not properly habituated about the benefits of using the e-wallets rather than credit or debit cards (Razif et al. 2020). As a result, the Malaysian people mainly prefer credit cards and debit cards to complete the online payment when they purchase any expensive items. 

Hypothesis 2(H2): Most of the Malaysian people prefer Credit/Debit card transactions rather than E-wallet process. 

Money Fraud Issue

Money fraud and personal data hijacking come under the fraud risk that can be considered as the independent variables for the e-wallet system issue in Malaysia. Due to this relevant issue, consumers are reluctant to use this service (Azizul Yadi et al. 2021). This contactless payment may introduce fraud like sensitive data leakage, e-wallet vulnerabilities, and undetected malware. 

Hypothesis 3(H3): E-wallet system must be free from money fraud like major cybercriminal activities. 

No Rewards

No rewards are given to the respective consumers while they are using the e-wallets. In the case of debit cards and credit cards, the people have scope to receive the discounts and gift cards like rewards respectively (Cheng et al. 2018). So, the financial marketers in Malaysia prefer to choose the debit/credit card transaction method to purchase any items.

Hypothesis 4(H4): If No rewards are given such as gift coupons or discount is not available, then users may lose their interest to use E-Wallets. 

Adoption of E-Wallet

In this research, the researcher will focus on the issues related to Malaysia’s e-wallet systems. Moreover, this project is aimed to discover the potential flaws to adoption of e-wallet system in this region. All of these issues will be considered from the security perspectives. As online research will be conducted due to this pandemic situation, then the researcher has not enough time to perform a deep analysis (Edeh et al. 2021). Similarly, a small interview session will be conducted here to collected data and rest of will be collected from past experiences or from online articles that are published recently. The online interviews will be conducted within a limited number of people as most of the people of Malaysia are not tech-savvy. So, it will be quite difficult to get the result with maximum accuracy.

Significant study of E-Wallet

Here, the researcher never considers the factor “transaction costs” as the e-wallet issues. People of Malaysia like developing countries do not prefer the digital wallet as a certain amount is required to deposit them for activation of this wallet (Derahman et al. 2020).

Another side is the “people awareness” that is not appropriately seen in Malaysia. Most of the Malaysian people are not aware of the way to use this digital payment system. Therefore, it becomes difficult to adaption of new technologies from the trust perspectives as a few numbers of people are tech-savvy in this region (Saadon and Long, 2020).  

To address this literature gap and improve the research program, appropriate theoretical frameworks need to be done. Therefore, some existing theories will be implemented throughout the research methodology section and the collected data will be applied to evaluate the research gap. It will be quite easier to recognize the problems with effortless solutions. Through effective frameworks, the specific problems can be located easily as per the research objectives. 

Discussion  

The aim of this project is to find out the issues with the online transactions; e-wallet system issues in Malaysia. The objective of the proposed framework is to identify the cybersecurity issues in digital transaction and to improve the adoption of using the e-wallet system across Malaysia. Through this cashless system, online fraud risk is the basic but the most severe issue from the marketing concept (Wong and Mohamed, 2021). Here, the security models will be proposed from the business security context to protect the consumer’s assets. The first security model is as generic problem solving framework and rest of the two suggested framework and models are effective to identify the online attack and e-wallet data theft issues respectively. 

Model 1: E-Wallet transactional Framework

The transaction program starts from the authentication process where the users need to follow the steps one after another.

First step, the registration program is the preliminary step to verify the user authentication. Both the customer data and user data are monitored by the e-wallet provider. Second step, the business retailer is ready to promote the specific product prices or item selling rates. Now, the e-wallet option is kept open to access for the registered users. Third step, the customer or buyer will now enter the product items and prices will be added immediately after entering the list of items. Now, the buyers are ready to perform transaction program. Next, the buyers need to login to that portal for user-verification and they need to perform two-step verification process to complete this program. It will provide a high-end of security without any effort. After that, once the user authorization process is completed, then the users can be eligible to use the e-wallet. Once the e-wallet is activated, the payment will be initiated for the e-commerce providers. Last step, the OTP verification will be there or any wallet code verification feature need to be completed to complete the transaction process.

Scope of E-Wallet

This model is especially designed to identify the possible system threats that may occur during online data transfer. Here, the mobile and other portable devices are used to complete the e-wallet transactions (Yaakop et al. 2021). So, this STRIDE model will be an ideal way to recognize the potential IOT threats and resolve them effectively.

Spoofing Identification:

As user authentication is required in the e-wallet process, then illegal access can be one of the major threats in this online transaction process (Bakar et al. 2020). Here, the login credentials can be hacked by intruders and this section of the framework will detect this problem earlier.

Tampering with the Sensitive Data:

Hackers may modify the data through various malicious activities and it can be harmful for the users. They can gain the access of the target devices and unauthorized changes can be done by them unethically at the time of online transaction.

Repudiation:

In this part, the data repudiation threats are recognized in the initial stage of the vulnerabilities. As a result, the transaction like online data transfer problem may occur as the devices deny to perform respective tasks.

Information Disclosure:

In this section, the personal data are exposed to other without notify the individuals. It is known as violation of data privacy. Therefore, the data privacy challenges need to recognized immediately to protect individual’s privacy preferences.

Denial of Service Attack:

It is quite common cyber-attack that hampers e-commerce sites as well as online transaction process. Here, the attackers attack the victim’s machine and makes its unable to access or the victim can see that the network is temporarily unavailable. 

Elevation of Privilege:

Privilege is a special act that is useful to exploit the bugs and design issues associated to the proposed system. Here, this framework section will predict the core problems like configuration issues that can be visible in the operation system of the accessible devices. Moreover, it is helpful to protect the credential data from the network layer of the e-wallet system. 

Digital Wallet Threat Model:

This threat model is another effective security model that can be used to perform mobile payment with ease. The trust of boundaries is described here to recognize the potential e-wallet issues effectively. The aim of this model is to locate the exact threat that may hamper the e-wallet security issues and it will be helpful to get the appropriate solutions to get rid of this issue effectively. This generic model is useful to analyze the potential security threats and attack vectors that are directly related to the digital wallet system. First step, user Verification via mobile. After that, the payment process will be initiated by providers. Next, card will issue by bank and wallet amount is accepted by payment gateway. Furthermore, payment service is authorized and data will be stored in an encrypted format. Lastly, payment data are checked and managed by online merchant. 

Literature Review

Theory Application 

To understand the theoretical applications on the online payment service, some case scenarios are taken into account. It will be helpful for researchers to know the effectiveness of the proposed solutions.

If a person uses the e-wallet service for online purchase, then he should maintain some security protocols. If someone hacks the customer’s e-wallet, then that hacker can easily spend that money once he/she gain access to that e-wallet credentials (Teoh Teng Tenk et al. 2020). The anti-theft framework that has been outlined in above is useful to identify the threats and STRIDE model is appropriate to perform it successfully. If regulatory compliance is not maintained and sufficient investment to monitor the threats regularly, then e-wallet security STRIDE will fail to detect the security issues. Similarly, a proper time management is required to overcome the data threats.  

The Digital Wallet threat model is effective for utilizing the e-wallet security features. It includes two-factor verification process with encryption that ensures that minimizes the money fraud issues. Here, the data are kept in an encrypted format. Here, the asymmetric key algorithm will be used to improve the security framework (Leong et al. 2021). As a result, the intruders will fail to hack the data as the data will be stored under cryptography and mitigate the low perception problems. Besides this, face recognition is also introduced under the STRIDE and E-Wallet Transactional Framework to make the system more compact and secure. 

Conceptual schema 

The conceptual framework is going to design by selecting the factors that are crucial to identify the e-wallet issues. The intension of this research work is to find out the independent and dependent variables that are involved to design the security framework effectively.

Fig 1. Conceptual Framework 

Research methodology on e-wallet issues in Malaysia will be conducted according to the hypothesis that are discussed in the literature review section. Moreover, all the questionnaires will be created according to the independent and dependent variables related to the electronic payment issues. 

Research Paradigm

The quantitative research methodology will be used. As the deductive approach is used, then the explained hypotheses will be executed according to the existing e-wallet issues in Malaysia. 

Quantitative analysis involves collecting data from online surveys and it is required to express in numerical form. This design will be structured in such a way that the pre-determined results can be built. Here, the hypothesis must be tested on a frequent basis that can be analysed with deductive approaches. The statistical methods will be involved to run the quantitative research analysis through deductive approaches.  

Issues of E-Wallet

Research design

This was an empirical research design that involved no experiment. By definition, an empirical research design is a design of study where verifiable evidence is used to draw conclusions. In reference to the definition above, the rating of E-wallet, a dependent variable, was analyzed based on regulatory compliance, Low perception, money fraud issue, and Rewards which are the independent variables. Particularly, online interview through questionnaire was applied. 

Study participants and sampling

The study population was the residents of Malaysia who have the capacity to perform online transactions, that’s is someone of 18 years and above. This makes age to be the first criteria for inclusion.  From the total population, a sample size of 103 respondents were selected to participate in the study. This involved random sampling and convenience sampling. For random sampling, the request link was sent to 110 people requesting them to willingly participate. Thereafter, convenience sampling was used to select the 103 who were willing to participate. Of the 103, there were many females (n=54, 52%) than males (n=49, 48%). The second criteria for inclusion is the experience of using E-wallet in which case. Based on this criterion, of the 103 respondents selected, one person had no experience with E-wallet and hence was excluded from analysis thus leaving the total number of participants as 102 (n=53 for females and n=49 for males). In terms of age, most were of the proportion distribution is as presented in the table below.

Table 1. Age distribution

Age Group	count	Percentage
18-29	21	20.59%
30-39	70	68.63%
40-49	7	6.86%
50-59	3	2.94%
above 60	1	0.98%

It is evident from the table that most people belonged to the age group 30-39 years (n=71, 68.93%) which is the most active group in the financial and employment industry hence relevant for the study. The second most frequent age group was 18-29 years which is also relevant for the study. Only 1 respondent was of 60 years and above.

The next factor was respondents level of education and this is displayed below.

Table 2. Education level

Level of Education	Number	Percentage
Bachelor	57	55.88%
Diploma/Certificate	30	29.41%
High school and below	9	8.82%
Master	4	3.92%
PhD	2	1.96%

It is evident that most respondents were of Diploma/ Certificate qualification and above and hence it is good to assume that they have knowledge and experience on E-wallet.

The participants were also of different working sectors and this is presented below.

Table 3. Employment status

What is your employment status?	Number	Proportion
Entrepreneur	3	2.94%
Government Servant	3	2.94%
Housewife	3	2.94%
Other(s)	18	17.65%
Private Sector employee	73	70.59%
Student	3	2.94%

Most of the participants were in the private sectors followed by others. From the table, participants were mostly income earners and so with the capacity to use E-wallet for transactions.

Regulatory Compliance

The final factor was the income level of respondents which is presented in the table below.

Table 4. Income level

Income	Number	Proportion
Prefer not to say	21	20.59%
RM10001-RM12500	4	3.92%
RM12501 and above	2	1.96%
RM1500 -RM2,500	8	7.84%
RM2501-RM5000	34	33.33%
RM5001-RM7500	25	23.53%
RM7501-RM10000	9	8.82%

 
While 21 (20.59%) preferred not to disclose their income level, the rest, though with different income levels, had at least an income indicating that they had the capacity to transact through E-wallet. 

Research Materials

The study materials included a computer and questionnaire. It is through the computer that the questionnaire was designed and submitted to the respondents then received back. The questionnaire on the other hand, was constructed using Office365 in the computer. It contained five demographic questions on gender, age, education level, employment state and income level. In addition, it had ten questions ranging from the experience with E-wallet to regulatory compliance, Low perception, money fraud issue, and Rewards. The questions were majorly categorical and were thus answered in scaled intervals. For questions 10 to 15, a 5 option Likert scale (Strongly disagree, Disagree, Neutral, Agree, and Strongly Agree) was used. The last material was the consent form which informed the participants on the study purpose. It is through the consent form that the selected participants decided to take part in the study or not. 

Research Procedure

Upon successful completion of the questionnaire construction, online interview, a method of data collection was used. The respondents were sent two forms; first, they were presented with the consent form to go through. It is after reading the consent form that the decision to proceed or quit the study was made by the respondents. The 103 who read the form and accepted to take part in the study were then presented with the study questionnaire. For the remaining 7, the quit button was clicked which marked the end of their interview. Every participant submitted the questionnaire upon completion. Thereafter, the excel option was used in Office365 to transfer the data to Excel where analysis took place. 

Data cleaning and analysis

Cleaning

The original data was first coded giving the lowest value to the most negative results (1-Strongly Disagree or Worst rating of E-wallet) and the largest value the most positive (Strongly agree or 75 and above for rating-5). Thereafter, the missing values were dealt with where the average for the existing coded observations was computed and used to replace missing values. This was important for the purpose of regression analysis that requires the number of observations to be the same for all variables. 

Low Perception

Analysis

Data analysis involved both descriptive and inferential statistics. While the descriptive analysis was mainly concerned with providing data insights, tests of significance and conclusion mainly involved inferential statistics. Descriptively, frequency tests and graphs were used to display trends and relationships. Inferentially, a multiple linear regression test was performed on the influence of regulatory compliance, Low perception, money fraud issue, and Reward factors on the rating of E-wallet. This is a test of relationship between a dependent variable plus more than one independent variables. The choice of this test is justified by the fact that the dependent variable (E-wallet rating) is a continuous variable. This test embraces the general formula,

y = β0 + β1 +…+βn

where, y is the dependent variable, β0 the intercept coefficient, β1 +…+βn the respective independent variable coefficients. This was tested at 5% level of significance from which case, values below 0.05 lead to the rejection of the null hypothesis. 

Ethical considerations

This study was conducted based on several ethical standards. First, the participant privacy was maintained as no personal detail was included such as name or email address. Secondly, the concept of informed decision was ensured for the respondents as each one was provided with the research knowledge via consent form. The next standard considered was the avoidance of prejudice where the researcher did not alter the final data to meet specific criteria or preformed opinion of results. Finally, the research was conducted according to the legal standards and requirements. 

Reliability analysis

A Cronbach alpha test was conducted in Excel for the obtained data and this is presented below.

Table 5. Cronbach’s alpha

Components	Number of Items	Cronbach’s alpha
Regulatory Compliance	3	0.428656
Perception	3	0.533654
Money Fraud	3	0.751861
Gifts	3	0.793892
q15(combined variables)	4	0.554313
Questions7-15	19	0.728216

The highest internal consistency was recorded for the gifts statements (0.79) followed by money fraud (0.75) whereas the lowest value was 0.43 for regulatory compliance. In general, the Cronbach alpha’s value for all the 19 questions/statements was found to be 0.728 showing that the data’s internal consistency was good. Therefore, it is right to proceed with analysis using the data. 

After collected 103 responses from the volunteers from my friend, family, colleague and others, all of the data was key in into Microsoft Excel for further analysis. A general Cronbach’s alpha conducted on the questionnaire statements resulted in a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.55 which is averagely good. The analysis consists of descriptive statistics, Pearson correlation analysis, reliability test and multiple regression analysis. In this chapter, the data collected from 103 respondents were being interpreted and analyzed by using Microsoft Excel. The relationship between independent variables and dependent variables is comprehensively displayed through various tables and graphs. 

Money Fraud Issue

Descriptive statistics

Frequency tests were conducted on the distribution of several variables. The first was on the rating of E-wallet which is visualized using pie chart below.

 

Fig 2. Pie chart for E-wallet rating

From the pie chart, most people (more than half) rated the E-wallet, compared to other modes of transaction, as good (n=53, 52%) followed by those who were neutral (n=31, 30%), those who rated it to be 75 and above (n=14, 14%) and finally those who rated it below average (n=2, 2% for each of the two categories).

Next, regulatory compliance (question 10) was visualized using stacked bar plot and this is displayed below.

 

Fig 3. Stacked bar plot for regulatory compliance (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.43)

From the above graph, most respondents agreed to the statement that there is insufficient investment on E-wallet that makes it difficult to trust it for daily transaction (n=40) followed by those who strongly agreed (n=24), neutral (n=17), disagree (n=2) and strongly disagree (n=1). In addition, most of the respondents (n=42) agreed to the statement that without a major investment alongside a better regulatory protocol, there is a likelihood of online transaction in the E-wallet system of Malaysia. These were followed by 27 people who strongly agreed and the same number for those who were neutral. The remaining participants either disagreed or strongly disagreed. In the final statement regarding the possibility of security risk without proper control of E-wallet, responses followed a similar pattern to that of statement 1 where most people agreed (n=40) followed by those who strongly agreed (n=25) and neutral (n=17).

The next stacked bar plot was constructed for Low perception (question 11) based on its respective statements. This is displayed below.

 

Fig 4. Stacked bar pot for perception (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.53)

From the above graph, most people (n=47) agreed that E-wallet is preferred for use above credit/ debit card followed by those who were neutral (n=37) and those who disagreed (n=37). Very few people either strongly agreed or disagreed. For the second statement, most people (n=42) agreed that there is more security in E-wallet than in Debit/Credit cards followed by those who were neutral and those who disagreed (n=30 each), those who strongly disagreed (n=13) and finally those who strongly agreed (n=2). The last statement on the convenience of E-wallet based on lower cost ahead of Credit and debit card followed the same trend as that of statement 2 above.

No Rewards

The next stacked plot was constructed for money fraud issue based on the corresponding three statements and this is displayed below.

 

Fig 5. Stacked bar plot for money fraud statements (Cronbach’s alpha = 0.75)

From the figure, the statements that E-wallet is more susceptible to cybercrime than other transactional methods and that E-wallet controllers expose clients to more cybercriminal activities such as exposing their personal details and account balances to hackers had similar responses where most people agreed (n=35) followed by those who strongly agreed (n=24), the neutral category (n=22), disagreed (n=4) and finally strongly disagreed. Nevertheless, the trend was different for the statement that E-wallet system must be free from money fraud like major cybercriminal activities for many people to embrace it where, though most people agreed (n=39), the second largest category were neutral (n=28) then those who strongly agreed (n=26), disagreed (n=4) and strongly disagreed (n=3).

The fourth stacked bar plot was constructed for the gift section based on its three statements and this is displayed below.

 

Fig 6. Stacked bar plot for gift statements(Cronbach’s alpha = 0.79)

While most people (n=40) agreed that they only use E-wallet based on the rewards they get from it, 28 strongly agreed to the statement followed by 12 who were neutral, 6 who disagreed and 1 who strongly disagreed. This was a similar trend for statement 2 where most people (n=39) agreed that compared to Credit/Debit cards, the amount of gift provided by E-wallet was more followed by those who strongly agreed (n=28), the neutral group (n=11), those that disagreed (n=6) and the strongly disagreed category (n=1).

Finally, the summary of these variables in question 15 was visualized using stacked bar plot and this is displayed in the figure below. 

 

Fig 7. Stacked bar plot for variable summary

From the above graph, most people agreed that E-wallet has recommend ably dealt with cybercrime issues (money fraud) (n=45) followed by those who were neutral (n=24), those who strongly agreed and those that disagreed (n=8 each) and those that strongly disagreed (n=1). For the statement of recommending E-wallet ahead of other transactional methods (perception) most agreed (45) followed by 24 who were neutral, 8 each for the strongly agreed and disagreed and finally 1 who strongly disagreed. For the statement of goodness of E-wallet in terms of awards and gifts, (gifts) most agreed (45) followed by 23 who were neutral, 8 each for the strongly agreed and disagreed and finally 1 who strongly disagreed. Finally, for the satisfaction on E-wallet in terms of investment (regulatory compliance), while most agreed (n=49), 31 were neutral followed by 10 who strongly agreed, 9 that disagreed and 2 who strongly disagreed. 

Inferential statistics

A multiple linear regression was run on the rating level of E-wallet (dependent variable-question 8) based on Regulatory compliance, Money fraud issues, perception and gifts (independent variables – question 15 statements). The variables, regulatory compliance, perception, money fraud issues, and gift variables explained 21.17% of the model variation which is lowly average. The independent variables displayed a joint significant influence on the E-wallet rating (F (4, 97) = 6.51, p = .0001). Individually, only regulatory compliance (t (4.41), p<.05)) was a significant predictor of E-model rating and hence its hypothesis statement accepted. On the other hand, money fraud issue (t (-.69), p = .49), Perception (t (1.51), p = .14), and gifts (t (-.76), p = .44) were insignificant model predictors and as such, their respective hypotheses statements rejected. These values are presented in table 7 below. The resulting model equation from table 8 is,

E-wallet rating = 2.245113 + 0.404448 (regulatory compliance) – 0.07621 (Money Fraud issue) + .180107 (Perception) – 0.08594 (Gifts)

From the equation, it implies that assuming all the independent variables are kept at 0, then the E-wallet rating is 2.245113. In addition, keeping other factors constant, then a change of regulatory compliance from a negative to a more positive value, for example, from strongly disagree (1) to Disagree, results in a 0.404448 in the rating of E-wallet. Similarly, an improvement of perception from a negative to a more positive value results in a 0.180107 rise in the E-wallet rating. Nevertheless, the change of money fraud responses to a more positive response by a unit results in a 0.07621 reduction in E-wallet rating while doing the same for gift variable results in a 0.08594 decline in the E-wallet rating. 

Discussion And Conclusion

In this section it is discussed the study findings, hypotheses and comparison of the results to previous works of literature. Also, theoretical and practical implications are discussed. Moreover, study findings, recommendations and conclusion are also included.

Discussion of findings

This study was set to establish the influence of perception, gifts and awards availability, cases related to money fraud, regulatory compliance on the E-wallet (rating particularly) within Malaysia. It was established that these variables displayed a joint significant influence on the E-wallet rating which is key to its adoption within the country. Nevertheless, there was only one individual variable (regulatory compliance) that substantially predicted the model while the remaining three did not. The three variable in significance can possibly be attributed to the omission of variable error that likely caused confounding and hence influenced the variable significance. The joint significance confirms the reality that the adoption of E-wallet, which mainly relies on potential and existing customer ratings, is affected by several factors among them the level of money security, regulatory compliance, the gifts awarded during use and how it rates when compared to other transactional factors such as Debit/Credit cards. Comparing this study results to past works of literature, then there are several similarities and differences. To start with, the joint significance results was similar to that of Azizul and colleagues (2021) who discovered that though many individual factors influence significantly the use of E-wallet, there is an interaction effect of different independent variables on the use of E-wallet and its rating. Particularly, they found a strong substantial influence in the interaction between security and regulatory compliance on the rating of E-wallet and hence its adoption. In support of this, Mahmudul and colleagues (2021) established that factors like the gifts provided and the perception based on other means of online transactions interactively impact the rating of E-wallet, a result similar to the one in this study. In a different study by Thai and Kuwa (2021) while seeking to establish the influence of security, individual perception and the preference of E-wallet over other transactional methods, found that these variables not only display an individual significant impact but also joint influence on the E-wallet usage and rating within Malaysia and this is similar to the findings in this study. For individual variables, Wasiul et al. (2020), in quest to establish the influencers of E-wallet usage, found that Regulatory compliance was a major evident impactor of E-wallet usage within Malaysia. In an explanation to this, they stated that strict adherence to the Malaysian economic, social and ethical laws adds to the attractiveness of using E-wallet ahead of other methods. Particularly, high adherence to laws and regulations adds to trust by the people. As well, the Malaysian government through its central bank lists rule abiding transactional methods and recommends them for people which significantly increases its chances of adoption by the residents of the country. In a different study by Zen et al. (2021), it was found that compared to other influencers such as the brand familiarity and embracement, past experiences and recommendation from friends, regulatory compliance is not a substantial factor on the use and rating of E-wallet in the world including Malaysia. In their argument, they stated that E-wallet is more of online and hence can violate most rules of the land despite consistently being used. As well, they cited that the E-wallet usage within the country should rather be attributed to the extent at which the regulatory compliance is maintained by other transactional methods. According to this argument therefore, though E-wallet may violate the government and economical rules and regulations, the level at which other methods such as Credit/ Debit card violate such rules is a more significant influencer of adopting E-wallet thus making compliance to regulation a secondary need. Most studies previously established that issues related to money fraud significantly affect the choice and rating of E-wallet, finding that’s different from the one in this study. In line with this, Min and colleagues (2021) discovered that online transactions are prone to money fraud and E-wallet is not an exception. Particularly, most these channels are not controlled by local governments thus exposing users more to fraud. Hence, E-wallet is substantially impacted by Money fraud cases, a finding that’s different from the one in this study. As well, Nurul-Ain (2021) found as the main influencer of E-wallet the money fraud cases. This, according to them, was arrived at considering many cases of online transaction money frauds. Equally, Noorshella et al. (2022) cited that online transactions are prone to cyber hacking and therefore, personal details leading to money fraud are released to the hands of unwanted people which may end up affecting the clients thus justifying the Money Fraud variable as a significant influencer of E-wallet usage and rating. In a similar study by Wasiul et al. (2020), a similar finding as the one in this study was established regarding the influence of gifts on the E-wallet rating and usage in Malaysia. While making explanation to this, they stated that this comes as a secondary influencer after users are assured of security and efficiency. They gave an instance of an online transactional tool where users are provided with many gifts irrespective of their security status and efficiency. Then in this case, people with money fraud and inefficient service experiences will automatically decide to forgo the coming gifts and discounts to protect their money and general privacy during transaction. In contrast, Alam and colleagues (2021) had a different result on the same as they established gifts to be a major component in the use of E-wallet. In particular, they stated that online transactional methods are daily increasing and with advanced security methods and strict adherence to the rule of law. Therefore, firms offering services like E-wallet must find additional means of attracting clients such as the use of gifts and awards as well as discounts. Equally, Thai and Ying (2021) concluded gifts to be a significant influencer of E-wallet and rating citing gifting as a major role in product market that’s been proven effective and hence E-wallet is not an exception. Based on the above comparisons, it is indicated that though most study results are similar, there are still some differences on variable effects on E-wallet usage findings thus making it difficult to make a general conclusion.

Theoretical

Theoretically, the study results established that E-wallet is affected jointly by gifts, money fraud, perception and regulatory compliance. Therefore, while addressing influencers of E-wallet usage in Malaysia, these factors should be considered generally. Hence, the study sets a background through hypothetical conclusions can be made regarding the influencers of E-wallet usage. It also sets a blur print through problems associated with online transactions can be addressed. Being that the study did not dig deep into the exact impact of money fraud and regulatory compliance, a further study is suggested that will deeply evaluate the exact theoretical impacts of these factors on E-wallet usage. In a different direction, a further study is appropriate that will consider gifts and perception with an aim of boosting E-wallet usage within Malaysia.

Practical

The results from this study will be useful for the purpose of study. As well, it sets a background through which future advanced scientific research regarding the usage and rating of E-wallet in Malaysia can be done. Finally, through comparing its findings to that of past literature, the study will be used to create harmony on the effects of regulatory compliance, perception, money fraud and gifts on E-wallet usage and rating in Malaysia.

Study limitation and suggestion for future research

This study was limited to three factors. The first factor was the error of omission where some of the significant influencers of E-wallet usage and rating were excluded and hence possibly led to confounding. The second limitation was that the study used a smaller sample size proportion compared to the larger Malaysian population that requires the use of the between 1200 – 1500 study participants. Finally, the study was conducted online for people whose emails were readily available and this excluded the rest of the population from selection thus sampling bias experienced alongside lack of generalizability. I therefore suggest a future study that will incorporate as many variables as possible such as recommendations from friends, government regulations, convenience and ease of access. This will be vital in eliminating confounding effects hence receive more accurate results. Further, I suggest that the study participants increase to at least 1200 so that the effect size of the independent variables can increase. Finally, for the suggested study above, I suggest the inclusion of others whose emails were not available so that everyone can have equal chance of participation as this will justify the generalizability of results to fit the Malaysian context as a country.

From the study findings, I recommend that the government/ concerned authorities handling E-wallet adoption in Malaysia to consider regulatory compliance variable as a significant influencer of E-wallet rating. For instance, in case there is a reduction in the usage of E-wallet, then they should check if the method has observed all the requirements. I also recommend that the stakeholders consider money fraud issue. Though proven to be an insignificant influencer of E-wallet, other studies discovered that it affects substantially the method and must be addressed to ensure E-wallet is safe and free from fraudsters for people to use it. Thirdly, they should take into consideration the issue of perception regarding the use of E-wallet. Particularly, the views of people regarding the transaction method should be collected to observe how people perceive the E-wallet to be. It is from this point that necessary amendments can be made. finally, they should consider gifts and awards for the users of E-wallet as this is a marketing strategy that attracts customers to using the method more so in situations where other transactional methods are more competitive.

5.5. Conclusion

This study sought to establish the influence of Regulatory compliance, low perception, monetary fraud issue and gifts on the E-wallet rating hence usage within Malaysia. It was established that these variables jointly influenced the rating of E-wallet in the country. However, only regulatory compliance was established to be a significant individual predictor of the model. From the past works of literature, there were experienced different conclusions regarding the significance in the influence of gifts, money fraud, and perception on the use of E-wallet in Malaysia thus creating inconsistency giving room for future research.

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