Corporate Governance & Ethics

Board of Directors

• In a for-profit organization, the board of directors oversees business activities and management.
• This oversight benefits shareholders, employees, customers, suppliers, and the community.

Corporate Ethics Officer

• A corporate ethics officer provides an organization with vision and leadership.
• This vision and leadership is specifically in the area of business conduct.

Sarbanes-Oxley Act, Section 404

• Annual reports must contain a statement signed by the CEO and CFO.
• The signed statement attests to the accuracy of information in the firm's SEC filings.
• Public companies must disclose their code of ethics and any waivers for senior management.
• A code of ethics must be accessible to employees, shareholders, business partners, and the public.
• The code of ethics must be continually applied to decision-making and emphasized as a company culture component.

Morality and Actions

• Moral acts conform to an individual's beliefs about what is right.

Codes of Ethics

• Codes of ethics include formal, written statements.
• These statements outline the purpose, values, and guiding principles for employees' actions.

Supply Chain Sustainability

• Supply chain sustainability is part of corporate social responsibility(CSR).
• It focuses on developing and maintaining a supply chain which meets present needs.
• Development and maintenance must not compromise future generations' ability to meet their needs.

Internet Growth Risks

• Increased risk of unethical use of personal data is caused by internet growth.
• Unethical use of personal data is also caused by expanded data capture and storage capabilities.

Workplace Ethics Alignment

• A corporate ethics officer aligns workplace practices with stated ethics and beliefs.
• This alignment holds employees accountable to ethical standards.

Morality Definition

• Morality refers to social conventions about right and wrong.
• This shared understanding becomes the basis for societal consensus.

Laws vs. Morality

• Laws can declare an act legal, even if many consider it immoral.

Virtues

• Fairness and generosity exemplify virtues.

Ethical Decision-Making: Fairness Approach

• The fairness approach to ethical decision making involves choosing actions/policies.
• Selected actions/policies should yield the best overall consequences for affected people, directly or indirectly.

Ethics and IT

• The general public may not understand the critical importance of applying ethics to IT.
• There is too much focus on technical issues.

Lawrence Kohlberg's Findings

• Monetary reward for good behavior is not the most crucial factor stimulating a person’s moral development.

Software Piracy Rates

• New Zealand had one of the lowest software piracy rates in 2011.

Decision-Making Process

• Decision-makers consider relevant laws, guidelines, policies, and principles.
• This consideration happens during the step of identifying alternatives.

Employee Values vs. Organization Actions

• A discrepancy between employee values and company actions can foster poor performance.

Satyam Computer Services Scandal

• The chairman of Satyam, an Indian outsourcing firm, admitted overstating assets.
• The overstatement was by more than $1 billion, in India's largest corporate scandal.

Stakeholders

• A stakeholder is someone who can gain or lose, depending on how a situation is resolved.

Ethical Decision-Making: Utilitarian Approach

• The utilitarian approach fits the concept of value in economics.
• The utilitarian approach utilizes cost-benefit analysis.

Decision-Making: Common Good Approach

• Decisions and policies using the common good approach aim to:
• Implement social systems
• Implement institutions
• Implement environments
• Decisions and policies must benefit everyone.

Code of Ethics Acceptance

• Employee participation is required for a code of ethics to gain wide company acceptance.

Code of Ethics Endorsement

• An organization's leadership must fully endorse its code of ethics for company acceptance.

Ineffective Solutions

• If desired results are not achieved, do not return to the "identify alternatives" step.

Unethical Behavior

• Greater globalization has not decreased the likelihood of unethical behavior.

United States v. New York Central & Hudson River Railroad Co.

• An employer can be liable for employee's acts, even if against employer directions.

Corporate Ethics Officer Appointments

• A rapid increase in corporate ethics officer appointments often follows a major business scandal revelation.

Business Ethics Survey (2009)

• Between 2007 and 2009, the percentage of employees increased .
• They admitted reporting misconduct in the workplace when they saw it.

Multinational Organizations & Values

• Multinational and global organizations must not present a consistent face to their stakeholders.
• A consistent face must instead operate with a different value system in each country they do business in.

Socially Responsible Activities

• Socially responsible activities create goodwill and make businesses easier to conduct.

Decision-Making Critical Step

• Developing a problem statement is the most critical step in the decision-making process.

Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR)

• CSR goals encourage creating work environments where employees act ethically.
• Organizations pursue CSR goals to gain community goodwill.

Problem Definition Process

• Avoid making assumptions during the problem definition process.

Strong Employee Relations

• Companies with strong employee relations see lower turnover rates.

Decision-Making Steps

• Gathering and analyzing facts occurs during problem statement development.
• Stakeholder identification also occurs during problem statement development.

Moral Corruption of Power

• The Bathsheba syndrome describes moral corruption in people of power.
• This corruption is facilitated by overlooking leaders' inappropriate actions.

Ethical Behavior Influence

• A manager has a big impact on ethical behavior.

Integrity

• Integrity means acting in accordance with a personal code of principles.

Employee Performance Appraisals

• Increasingly, managers include ethical conduct as part of performance appraisals.

Ethics and Compliance Programs

• Well-implemented programs/strong ethical cultures can reduce pressure to misbehave.

Board of Directors: Audit Committee

• The audit committee helps the board oversee accounting, reporting practices, and controls.
• The audit committee helps the board oversee financial statements and reports.

Organizational Departments: Internal Audit

• Internal audit is responsible for determining internal systems and control effectiveness.

Business Transactions

• Business transactions must be recorded according to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP).

Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

• The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recommended in 1972 that publicly held organizations establish audit committees.

Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA)

• The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) goal is prevent companies from;
• Using slush funds or other means to disguise payments to officials.

Fawcett Society Survey

• A survey by the Fawcett Society found that 20% of men admit to viewing pornography at work.

Professional Employee Definition

• The United States has labor laws and regulations to require further defining;
• Professional employer

Business Software Alliance (BSA)

• The Business Software Alliance (BSA) can assess heavy monetary penalties.
• This occurs when the Business Software Alliance (BSA) finds cases of software piracy.
• The Business Software Alliance (BSA) does not have a few dozen lawyers and investigators who prosecute only the 100 or so most egregious cases of software piracy each year.

Career Definition

• A calling that requires specialized knowledge and often long and intensive academic preparation is called “Career”.

Material Fact

• A misstatement or an incomplete statement of a material fact is;
• Misrepresentation

Trade Group Funding

• A trade group that is funded through dues based on member companies' software revenues and through settlements from companies that commit software piracy is called;
• Business Software Alliance (BSA)

Internal Audit Team

• Members of the internal audit team should not be experts in detecting and investigating financial statement fraud.

Professional Requirements

• Professionals require advanced training and experience.
• Professionals must exercise discretion and judgment.
• Professional work cannot be standardized.

Laws as Guides

• Laws do not provide a complete guide to ethical behavior.

Proving Fraud

• To prove fraud, prosecutors must demonstrate that the wrongdoer made a false representation of a material fact.

Professional Code of Ethics

• A professional code of ethics states the principles and core values that are essential to the work of a particular occupational group.

Negligence Definition

• Negligence is defined as not doing something that a reasonable person would do, or doing something that a reasonable person would not do.

IT Workers and Ethics

• Accepting bribes or gifts from suppliers in exchange for business advantages is a key ethical challenge for IT workers.

Value of Certifications

• Certifications from industry associations generally require a certain level of experience and a broader perspective than vendor certifications.

Defendants Expertise Measurement

• Defendants are measured against a reasonable professional standard when the have expertise or competence

Sets of Skills & Abilities

• The core body of knowledge for any profession outlines agreed-upon sets of skills and abilities that all licensed professionals must possess.

Duty of Care (Legal Perspective)

• From a legal perspective, there is both a reasonable person standard and a reasonable professional standard to decide whether parties owe a duty of care.

Duty of Care Breach

A breach of duty of care is not conforming to the code of ethics of a professional organization.

Policy and Boundaries

• Policies cannot stop wrongdoers.
• Policies establish boundaries for acceptable and unacceptable behavior.
• Policies enable management to punish violators.

Compliance

• Compliance does not mean being in conformance with a profession's core body of knowledge.

Internal Audit Department & Board of Directors

• The internal audit department does not include members of the board of directors.

Fraud Definition

• Fraud is the crime of obtaining goods, services, or property through deception or trickery.

Penalties for FCPA Violations

• Corporations can face penalties up to $2 million per violation for violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).

Computing Society

• The Association for Computing Machinery is a computing society founded in 1947.
• It has more than 97,000 members.
• It has student and professional members in over 100 countries.
• The Association for Computing Machinery publishes over 50 journals and 30 newsletters.

Certifications

• Certifications are true about certification.
• Certifications can be applied to products.

Firewalls

• A firewall Is a hardware or software device that serves as a barrier between a company and the outside world.
• A firewall limits access to the company's network based on the organization's internet usage policy.

IT Industry Association Certifications

• Industry association certifications exist in various IT-related subject areas.

WikiLeaks Web Site Example

• Posting State Department documents on WikiLeaks is an example of inappropriate sharing of information.

Bribery Definition

• Bribery is providing money, property, or favors to someone in business or government to obtain a business advantage.

Courts Apply Duty of Care

• Courts apply a reasonable person standard to determine duty of care .
• Reasonableness is measured by how an objective, careful, and conscientious person would act.

IT Malpractice Lawsuits

• Many courts have ruled that I.T. workers are not liable for malpractice, because they do not meet the legal definition of a professional.

Facilitating Payments

• The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) allows facilitating payments for 'routine government actions.'.
• This includes, but is not limited to obtaining permits or licenses.

Exams & Objectivity

• Vendor certifications usually contain multiple-choice questions.
• Testing format is used due to legal concerns about whether other types of exams can be graded objectively.

Vishing definition

• Vishing does not lead consumers to counterfeit Websites designed to trick them into a denial-of-service attack.

Hackers

• Smart and talented and technically inept hackers can be referred to by more skilled hacker as ;
• Lamers
• Script kiddies

Computer Viruses

• Computer Viruses do not propagate through worms rather they have to propagate via human intervention

Worm Damage

• The cost to repair the worldwide computer worm damage as exceeded $1 billion on numerous amount of times

System Security

• System securety is measured on the policy people are involved with all aspects in network and technology

Malware Incident

• Malware infection incidents have been the most common security incidents

Spear phishing attack

• Spear phishing does not employ automated requests that are sent by a stream

Rootkit access

• A rootkit is a program that allows users to gain administrator-level access

Trojan horse

• A trojan horse is not an umbrella for many types of malicious code

Campaign cost

• The cost to create an email campaign is typically more expensive than direct mail

Fraud and malicious insiders

• Fraud malicious insideres tend to involve a high rate of collusion and or communication to cause this attack

Spying

• Competitive intelligence analysts do not get the name that they have for spying on other companies

Insiders and Actions

• Malicious insiders do not mean well, but they have the capability fo considerble damage

Completed Risk Assessment

• Most common cyber threats happen when there is a risk assessment of those around a company or entity.

Automated systems following the same policies

• Make as secure as possible automated system rules must mirror the same written policies of the organization

Importance of education about security

• Educated workers understand so that they are aware of any polices and risks

Installation of a security system

• Instalation of a security protocol does not mean that the system secure and will have protection

Safeguard Against Attacks

• As a policy against attacks of malicious intent, it is in the best interstest of most organizations who are a company to define the rolse that an employee may have against inputs against purhcase orders.

Security Audit

• When performing a security audit of an organization it is not unusal to reveal to the auditor that there is those with too many rights, however over what access

Determined Attack From a Computer

• Even with preventative measurements in place, nothing can provide enough protection

Costs VS Potential

• Discussing a security attack through public relations , trials and associated publicity has and does have enormous potential

Monitor intruders in a security attack

• When there is a monitor breach or threat, there must be primary goal to gain control with limit the damage possible

Hacktivisim

• Hacktivism involves the actions to trade secrets from competitors

Intrusion System

• This is one where if there is any resources that is used to monitor the system and activities, any attempt to circumvent measures that are of computer inviorment

Competitive intellegence

• This one here has one single collection of aspects when the information that so will have to determine when the data will be in court

Developers creating and coding

• The use of programmers quickly create a patch when there have been vulnerabilities exposed

Dropper file

• Dropper files that are easily activated if you use a web link that directs too malicious link to an infected file

Cyberterrorism

• If there are any means to get a better cyber definition, you will need to see what the underpinnings will be to be tried an be a cyberterroists