Ethics and information systems
- Ethics refers to the principles of right and wrong that individuals, acting as free moral agents, use to make choices to guide their behaviors
- Ethical issues in information systems have been given new urgency by the rise of the Internet and electronic commerce
What are information rights and obligations?
Primarily deals with privacy issues
What are property rights and obligations?
Primarily deals with intellectual property issues
What is accountability and control?
Primarily deals with issues of liability for unintentional consequences of system use
What is system quality?
Primarily deals with issues of data quality and system errors
What is quality of life?
Primarily deals with negative social consequences
What is doubling of computer power?
- Has made it possible for most organizations to use information systems for critical operations
- Our dependence on systems and our vulnerability to system errors and poor data quality have thus increased
What is rapidly declining data storage costs?
- Has made it possible for organizations to easily maintain detailed databases on individuals
- Has made the routine violation of individual privacy both cheap and effective
What are advances in data analysis techniques?
Has made it possible for companies to analyze vast quantities of data to develop detailed profiles of individual behavior; these profiles may be sold to other companies or gov’t agencies
What are networking advances and the internet?
Has made it possible to copy data from one location to another as well as access personal data from remote locations
What is the professional code of contact?
- Often times professionals take on special rights and obligations because of their special claims to knowledge, wisdom, and respect
- Professional codes of conduct are promulgated by associations of professionals
- Codes of ethics are promises by professions to regulate themselves in the general interest of society
- There is no formal code of conduct for IT professionals
What is privacy?
the claim of individuals to be left alone, free of surveillance or interference from other individuals, organizations, or the state
What are the fair information practices (FIP)?
a set of principles governing the collection and use of information about individuals
What are cookies?
Tiny files deposited on a computer hard drive that tracks a user’s visit to a Web site
What are web bugs?
Tiny graphic files embedded in e-mail messages and Web pages that are designed to monitor online Internet user behavior
What is spyware?
Technology that aids in gathering information about a person or organization without their knowledge
Opt-out vs. opt-in Model
- Opt-out model permits collection of personal info until consumer requests the data not be collected
- opt-in model prohibits business from collecting personal info unless consumer specifically takes action to approve information collection and use
What is intellectual property?
Intellectual property is considered to be intangible property created by individuals or corporations that is subject to protection under trade secret, copyright, and patent law
What is a trade secret?
- Any intellectual work or product used for a business purpose that can be classified as belonging to that business, provided it is not based on information in the public domain
- Trade secret law protects the actual ideas in a work product as well as their manifestation
What is copyright?
A statutory grant that protects creators of intellectual property against copying by others for any purpose during the life of the author plus an additional 70 years after the author’s death
What is a patent?
Grants the owner an exclusive monopoly on the ideas behind an invention for 20 years
