Ethics and Privacy Concerns

Ethics

involves making choices about what a person should do, say, and even what to think

Ethics vs Morals

morals = virtuous life

ethics = rational framework for morals

Relationship between ethics and laws

study of society’s legal guidance can frame ethical study

Deepfake

synthetic media in which a person in an existing image or video is replaced with someone else’s likeness and encourages insular information streams

Illegal activity

using the business’s computers or network in a criminal act such as theft of computer hardware, copyright infringement, software piracy, recording piracy, child pornography, computer scams, bomb threats, and federal computer security violations

Organizational policy violations

determined by the standards set by the employer, usually includes prohibitions against sending personal email, shopping, visiting social media, etc.

Five fundamental ethical principles for managers

autonomy, non-malfeasance, beneficence, justice, fidelity

Five fundamental ethical principles for accountants

integrity, objectivity, competence, confidentiality, professionalism

Five dimensions of ethical behavior in the digital age

information rights, copyrights and intellectual property, control and accountability, establishing standards, quality of life

Information rights

rights of individuals and organizations to privacy of the individual’s personal information

Intellectual property

creative work like artwork, literary works, inventions, music, images

Control and accountability

examines how individuals or corporations can be held accountable in case of violations of privacy or intellectual property rights

Whack-a-mole phenomenon

one site is taken down for malfeasance, another is opened nearly instantaneously

Quality of life dimension

difficult to assess because dilemmas are usually complex and resolutions are weak compromises

Wells Fargo Case

2016

• aggressive manager had encouraged branch employees to open new accounts by setting goals and offering rewards

• employees created fake accounts

• costed $3B & loss of reputation

Five steps for resolving delimmas

get all facts, determine who is affected, search for precedents, list options, deal with consequences

Five principles of ethical decision making

principle of moral rights, principle of virtue, principle of distributive justice, universalist principle, utilitarian principle

Principle of moral rights

some decisions are either intrinsically morally right or morally wrong

Principle of virtue

decision maker considers what a highly moral person would do

Principle of distributive justice

attempts to distribute rewards equitably among individuals based on levels of effort or productivity

• ex) incentives for sales

Universalist principle

manager must determine if a decision is fair for all involved

Utilitarian principle

do the ends justify the means? can ignore the rights of the individual

Privacy

right to control what happens with an individual’s personal information

Internet privacy

right of personal privacy concerning the storing, distributing, and displaying of information concerning an individual via the internet

Resolution 68/167

adopted by UN general assembly in Dec 2013

affirms that the rights held by people offline must be held online, called states to protect the right to privacy in digital communication

Effect of first amendment on internet privacy

limits government censorship

Supreme Court rejected legislation that was designed to protect children on the internet, calling it unconstitutional

Digital Millennium Copyright Act

1998

implements treaties of the World Intellectual Property Organization and is comprised of five titles meant to protect intellectual property in digital formats

Children’s Internet Protection Act

2000

children’s access to harmful content over the internet, requires pornographic sites to include age verification

Electronic Communications Privacy Act

1986

protects email and VoIP communications by making it illegal to intercept calls or messages without a warrant

US Patriot Act/USA Freedom Act

monitors terrorist activities and communications, allows law enforcement to obtain information about online and offline communications related to terrorist activities without a warrant

Federal Information Security Management Act

protects government information and assets against cyberthreats

Cybersecurity Information Act

improves cybersecurity by creating a network where information about threats can be shared between government and technology companies

Computer Fraud and Abuse Act

prohibits accessing a computer or network without proper authorization

Wiretap Act

protects person to person wire, oral, electronic communications

Cookie

small text file of information created by a website you visit, stored on hard drive, creates privacy problems

First-party cookies

created by a website you visit and keep track of your personal preferences and the current web browsing session

Third-party cookies

created by a website other than the one you are currently visiting, used to track surfing habits, invasion of privacy

Session cookies

small text files stored in temporary memory like RAM or cache, lost when browser is closed

Persistent cookies

stored on hard drive, not lost when web browser is closed, only lost if it has an expiration date

Opt-In and Opt-Out

common methods of gaining consumer permission to access the consumer’s information or track their behavior, take advantage of naiveté

Intellectual property

human knowledge and ideas that the law protects against unauthorized use by others

4 Categories of intellectual property

patents, trademarks, copyright, trade secrets

Copyright

form of protection provided by the laws of the US for original works of authorship (literary, musical creations, etc.)

Patent

government grants an inventor the right to exclude others from the use of the invention for a period of time

Types of patents

utility patent, design patent

Utility patent

granted for a new machine or process

Design patent

protects the unique appearance of an object

Digital Millennium Copyright Act

by President Clinton in 1998

updates copyright laws to deal with the issues of how to regulate digital material

• difficult to copy analog video recordings

• protects ISP for being sued when the user copies items from the internet

• allows educational institutions to use copyrighted material

Data

raw facts that describe the characteristics of an event, object, or set of information

Structured data

defined length, type, format

Big data

methodologies that attempt to deal with the vast amount of complex information that accumulates at high and accelerating velocity

Methodologies for gathering big data

asking the customer, indirectly tracking behavior, purchasing from third party

Examples of third-party data trackers

comscore, quantcast, acxiom

Transition in Big Data security

move to third-party cloud storage to reduce human factor in data protection

Steps to improve data privacy

exercise good password habits, incorporate anti-virus protection, practice safe browsing and online purchasing, monitor credit report

Another word for password

keycode

Antivirus software

scans files to identify and remove computer viruses and other malicious programs

Common techniques of antivirus programs

signature-based detection and heuristic-based detection

Signature-based detection

capitalizes on the fact that viruses are created with a specific set of data and instructions which constitute the signature, looks for signatures to find and remove virus

Heuristic-based detection

examines files for suspicious characteristics

Free vs fee-based antivirus software

free: basic detection and protection, ads, comparable malware detection performance

fee-based: identity theft protection, firewalls, parental controls

What can still be tracked in private browsing mode

IP address

Virtual Private Network

useful to protect online identity