Workshop 3 - Computer Ethics PDF

CSEC1001K : Foundation of Computing and Cyber Security Week 1 Workshop 3: Computer Ethics Module Aims Examine the ethical and social aspects of computing; Explore the complexity and multiplicity of computer ethics; Identify and evaluate the role of the IT prof...

CSEC1001K : Foundation of Computing and Cyber Security Week 1 Workshop 3: Computer Ethics Module Aims Examine the ethical and social aspects of computing; Explore the complexity and multiplicity of computer ethics; Identify and evaluate the role of the IT professionals Module Outcomes To be able to recognise social and ethical for asset handling in IT professionality 1. Demonstrate understanding, by explaining key theories and current ethical concerns in information systems and computing 2. Recognise, contextualise and apply ethical arguments to cases relevant to information systems and computing What is Ethic? “the discipline dealing with what is good and bad or right and wrong or with moral duty and obligation.”(Gove, 1996) Ethics often referred to as moral philosophy (not a science), and providing guidance on ethical and unethical conduct. it is very difficult to decide on what is the right thing to do and what is wrong. Ethics is concerned with providing reasonable justification for our decisions. It evaluates if an action is moral or immoral (Padallan, n.d.). Ethic Principles Mutuality/ Professional Behaviour : Are all parties operating under the same understanding of the rules of engagement? Generalizability/Diversity : Does a specific action follow a principle of conduct that is applicable to all comparable situations? Consideration for others /Professional Competence and Due Care: Does this action evidence authentic concern for the legitimate interests of others? Respect/Confidentiality /Privacy: Does this action demonstrate due consideration for the dignity and rights of others? Honesty /Integrity: Is this decision and the process leading to it straight-forward and forthright Distinction between Ethic and Law What is right is also what is legal and that what is legal is also what is right! Is it possible for an act to be ethical but illegal, or, conversely, unethical but legal? ethics and law are not the same thing. Although practitioners should remain aware of laws that apply to their actions, compliance with the law, on its own, may be insufficient to guide a practitioner to ethical action. Does it really matter – in today’s world? 8 Philosophical/Logical Analysis Philosophical Analysis (Barger, Robert N.. Computer Ethics : A Case-based Approach) – It is not about isolated individual judgments concerning whether certain actions are right or wrong. – It is about how a particular worldview – or more precisely, a weltanschauung – underlies and determines the formulation of such ethical judgments. – “What you think the meaning of life is, determines how you live it.” – Philosophical systems: Idealism Realism Pragmatism Existentialism Applied Ethics ▪ Medical ethic ▪ Bioethics ▪ Legal ethic ▪ Public sector ethics ▪ Business ethics; ▪ Manufacturing ethics ▪ Automation Ethics ▪ Robotic Ethics ▪ Environmental ethic ▪ Computer ethic ▪ etc Computer Ethics/ Information Ethics James H. Moor, a philosopher at Dartmouth College Moor spoke of computers as “logically malleable,” and “policy vacuums” computer ethics is a way to analyse of nature and social impact of computer technology and formulation of appropriate corresponding policies. It is the study of moral, legal and social issues involving in cybertechnology (for cyber professionals and users) the unique features of computers and the way in which they operate have created new ethical problems.(Barger, Robert N.. Computer Ethics : A Case-based Approach) Speed/reflex behaviour malleability Storage Authentication tool ✓ Professional Internationality ethics Copying/stealing ✓ Philosophical Perversion ethics Social issues Anonymity A new ethic system has been proposed known as “Information Ethics” (Spinello and Tavani, 2004) Ethical Decision Making Process 8 steps involving questions to be answered in resolving computer ethics dilemmas: ✓ Step 1. Identify an ethical problem ✓ Step 2. Describe and analyse the ethical issues in the case in form of conceptual and factual terms (privacy, security, bias, etc). ✓ Step 3. Identify the stakeholders in the case and tell what you think each of them would like to see as an outcome. ✓ Step4. Look and research if there are policy vacuum on the problem identified and the targeted stakeholders. Could you find a law/policy in the domain? ✓ If yes: Step 5. Apply ethical theories behind the policy or relevant law to the problem ✓ If No: Step 5. ✓ A) Propose three possible solutions to the case (two extremes and a compromise). Mark them a), b), and c). ✓ B) Give a best-case and worst-case outcome for each solution and, for each solution, indicate whether you could tolerate the worst- case outcome. C) Which of the three solutions would you choose? Ethical Decision Making Process ✓ Step 6. ✓ A) Is this solution in accord with what is natural (e.g., in accord with human nature, the environment, or the inherent purpose of anything else involved in the case)? Explain. ✓ B) Is this solution balanced between an approach that might be excessive on the one hand and deficient on the other? Explain. ✓ Step 7. ✓ A) Would there be majority agreement that this solution is the most efficient means to the end? Explain. ✓ B) Will it produce the greatest good for the greatest number of people? Explain. ✓ Step 8. ✓ A) Is this solution the one you feel most committed to in your own conscience, regardless of whether or not it benefits you personally? Explain. ✓ B) Do you choose this solution in an autonomous manner, as the final arbiter of the good, free from the influence of others? Explain. ✓ Which philosophy do you feel was most influential in your solution to this case? Why? Privacy “It is right of individuals to be left alone” (Warren and Brandeis, 1890) “someone’s right to keep their personal matters and relationship secret” (Cambridge Dictionary, 2022) Two kinds of situations pose a threat to the privacy of the people (Padallan, Jocelyn O.. Information and Computer Ethics): rapid development of IT that tool with an improved intensity for surveillance, correspondences, digitization, storage, and retrieval. the value of the information that has gone up in the process of taking important decisions. Examples: ✓ Cookies ✓ Data mining Digital age: Is our privacy under threat? ✓ Surveillance "As more and more data is generated about ✓ Hacking us, as we go about our daily lives it is essential ✓ Information sharing & selling that data protection is seen as a human rights ✓ Social Media issue and not just as a compliance issue," said ✓ Big Data Ailidh Calendar of Privacy International. ✓ IOTs & Smart Homes OHCHR - Nov 19 2018 ✓ Online search for personal data Free Speech Freedom of speech refers to people’s ability to say what they want without punishment. Filtering & censorship Blogs & Forums Slowing Internet speed Obligations owned to client Negligence: to establish a duty of care in order to avoid foreseeable damage caused by the breach of duty. Tort of Negligence Jones VS Karely case (2011) (Bailii.org, 2022) Jones (Appellant) v Kaney (Respondent)- The Supreme Court Software developers Forensic Investigators Expert Witnesses Information Security Analysts Penetration testers Intellectual Property Intellectual property is something produced by using one’s mind (Barger, 2008) There are significant financial and moral concerns encompassing protected innovation rights Registered IP rights Trademark Open sourcing Reverse engineering Patent Peer-to-peer sharing Licensing Software licensing Encryption Online Music sharing Unregistered IP Rights Copyright (software products are mostly protected by copyright or patent) Public Domain AI & Ethics Prediction: Based on Observations ❖ Prediction from explicit rules Discrimination ❖ Weak AI: Prediction from emerging rules Privacy Based on Interventions, Counterfactuals Accuracy ❖ Hard AI: Prediction based on reasoning, causal inference Algorithmic Decision making Customers – Human Product/Churn Credit/loans Insurance Medicine (e.g. Netflix) Resources Predictive Domestic Predictive Education Risk policing violence policing Vulnerability Testing The process of searching for, finding, disclosing, and acting in response to, security vulnerabilities causes recurring ethical (and legal) issues unauthorised efforts to gain access to a computer system trade secret rights (reverse engineering) Disclosure of vulnerabilities Questions Which ethical issues arise from following cases? Do you believe that new moral and ethical issues have arisen in above cases or they resist on old ethical issues? Case 1: Verizon and the Recording Industry In January 2003, a United States district court in the District of Columbia ruled that Verizon (an Internet service provider or ISP) must comply with a subpoena by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA)—an organization that represents the interests of the recording industry. The RIAA, in an effort to stop the unauthorized sharing of music online, requested from Verizon the names of two of its subscribers who allegedly made available more than 600 copy-righted music files on the Internet. Although many ISPs, such as Comcast, and many universities complied with similar subpoenas issued on behalf of the RIAA, Verizon refused to release the names of any of its subscribers. Verizon argued that doing so would violate the privacy rights of its subscribers and would violate specific articles of the U.S. Constitution. So, Verizon appealed the district court’s decision. On December 19, 2003, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia overturned the lower court’s decision, ruling in favor of Verizon. Tavani, H.T. (2009). Ethics and technology : ethical issues in an age of information and communication technology. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley ; Chichester. Case 2: The Amy Boyer Cyberstalking On October 15, 1999, Amy Boyer, a twenty-year-old resident of Nashua, NH, was murdered by a young man who had stalked her via the Internet. The stalker, Liam Younes, was able to carry out most of the stalking activities that eventually led to Boyer's death by using a variety of tools available to him online. Through the use of standard Internet search facilities, for example, Younes gathered information about Boyer that was readily accessible from databases available to online search requests. A series of Internet searches on the name "Amy Boyer" yielded several pieces of information about Boyer, which Younes could then piece together to track down his victim. Through the use of certain tools available to any Internet user, he was able to find out where Boyer lived, where she worked, what kind of vehicle she drove, etc. In addition to using Internet search-related tools to acquire personal information about Boyer, Younes was also able to use other kinds of online tools, provided by Internet Service Providers (ISPs), to construct two Web sites. On one site, he posted personal information about Boyer, including her picture, and on another site he described, in explicit detail, his plans to murder Boyer. Tavani, H.T. (2009). Ethics and technology : ethical issues in an age of information and communication technology. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley ; Chichester. Case 3: MGM v. Grokster On June 27, 2005, the Supreme Court issued its ruling in MGM v. Grokster, ruling that the providers of software that designed to enable “file-sharing” of copyrighted works may be held liable for the copyright infringement that takes place using that software. The Court held that “one who distributes a device with the object of promoting its use to infringe copyright, as shown by clear expression or other affirmative steps taken to foster infringement, is liable for the resulting acts of infringement by third parties.” Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (MGM) v. Grokster, Ltd. | Case Brief for Law Students (casebriefs.com) Case 4: Software developer A programmer discovers that a software product she has been working on is about to be released for sale to the public even though that the product is unreliable because it contains buggy software Tavani, H.T. (2009). Ethics and technology : ethical issues in an age of information and communication technology. Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley ; Chichester. Case 5: Software Development Marry is the project manager of a game development company. She recently attended a conference and one of the articles topic was on “ Gender Bias in Software Development”. After this, she performed a user survey on one of the games developed by her company when she discovered that girl users found the game very male-oriented. She also identified the main reason of this issue as shortage of female developers in her company. Code of Conducts ▪ ACM (Association for Computing Machinery) Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct ▪ Software Engineering Code of Ethics and Professional Practice ▪ Ten Commandments of Computer Ethics ▪ Institute for Certification of IT Professionals (ICCP) Code of Ethics Ethic by Design The aim of Ethics by Design is to incorporate ethical principles into the development process allowing that ethical issues are addressed as early as possible and followed up closely during the development (Ethics By Design and Ethics of Use Approaches for Artificial Intelligence, 2021) This is achieved by proactively using the principles as system requirements. Ethical Principles Ethical Requirements Ethical Guidance Development Methodology Development Figure 1: The 5-layer Model of Ethics by Design (Ethics By Design and Ethics of Use Approaches for Artificial Tool Intelligence, 2021) Question? Thank you!