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Usage of cloud services instead of traditional on-premise resources is a common approach that organizations widely prefer. The COVID-19 situation, even more, highlighted the importance and advantages of cloud computing. The reason is that ‘home-office’ has become a normal and widely adopted way of working in many worldwide organizations. The homeoffice results in the requirements that the data and resources need to be available everywhere over the internet. The target of this article is to identify how the consumption of cloud services differs in the Czech Republic (referred also as ‘Czechia’), Visegrád Group where the Czech Republic is a member and in the European Union in general.Since the adoption of cloud services has an increasing trend, as was described above, the comparison will indicate whether the consumption of the Czech Republic corresponds to the consumption in the countries from Europe.

Fraud has metamorphosed into a major global concern. Regardless of size, profitability, or industry, organizations currently face severe challenges concerning economic and operational sustainability in the wake of deliberate and unethical fraudulent acts. The PricewaterhouseCoopers (hereinafter referred to as PwC) (2020) survey revealed that 47% of international firms were affected by fraud compared to 49% in 2018, 36% in 2016, 37% in 2014, and 34% in 2011. The PwC’s (2020) survey respondents reported total losses of 42 billion USD owing to fraud that negatively impacted brands, reputations, and market shares. Ironically, only 56% of the affected organizations conducted investigations, whereas barely one-third of these companies reported fraudulent outcomes to their boards.

The crisis caused by the COVID-19 pandemic has become an unpredictable global risk and is one of the largest global public health crises so far. At the same time, it triggers a serious economic crisis at the country and global levels and can have severe consequences for the future. The primary objective (with a view also to further economic development) must now be the protection of human health. Strict measures were and are necessary to prevent the spread of a disease that does not know any borders in today’s globally interconnected world, but which, to an unexpectedly large extent, restrict the functioning of businesses and the economy as a whole, thereby seriously disrupting many value chains. Although it is currently impossible to predict the overall economic impact of the crisis, it is already clear that it is a huge external shock manifesting itself on both the supply and demand sides.

The world had only just bounced back from the 2009 crisis when in 2020 COVID-19 triggered one of the biggest crises in almost a century, according to the OECD (2020b), causing a major disruption to world health, economic activity, well-being, and jobs. Estimated GDP performance in 2020 shows the 27 members of the European Union on average lost 6.1% of GDP compared to 2019 and around 660,000 jobs, despite substantial government support. The greatest decline was seen in Italy, losing almost 11% of GDP over 2019. Spain, Greece, and Croatia lost 8% or more of GDP, being hit largely due to their dependence on tourism. CEE economies lost between 2.7% (Poland) and 5.6% (Slovenia) of GDP (Eurostat, 2021). While aggregate estimates have been available for a few months, very little evidence can be found on the crisis’ impact on the firm level and the contribution made by various factors to differences in firm performance in 2019.

The health is defined as a state of a person’s physical, mental, and social well-being. Responsibility for health is determined not only by the healthcare system and genetic predispositions of individuals but also by one’s lifestyle and approach to achieving and keeping a good state of health (World Health Organization, 2006). Consumer behaviour concerning healthcare differs from other areas, above all because it is “a question of life and death”. Therefore, this type of decision-making tends to get significantly affected by emotions (Cazacu, 2015). Another significant difference is that consumers get healthcare products and services through a third party, most often a physician, who recommends steps to be taken and makes the decisions (Radulescu et al., 2012). Kenkel (1990) states that physicians can create or reduce demand for their services. Meeting health care needs is not always a matter of consumer choice, but other factors also play a role.