Topics in IT Ethics

Question: Write an essay about the classical ethical theories. Answer: Introduction The essay analyses and justifies the classical ethical theories of an article which was published on The Sydney Morning Herald on November 26, 2014. The title of the article which the author analyses and reviews in this essay is Maker of Smartphone surveillance app fined, avoids jail time. Matt Zapotosky has penned the article for the newspaper (Yoder, 2014). The article talks about the maker of the Smartphone surveillance app Mr. Hammad Akbar who is a resident of the Lahore district in Pakistan. Hammad created an app named StealthGenie which helped to catch lovers who were cheating on their respective partners. Installing the app in the Smart phones the people who are suspicious about the loyalty of their partners can track the locations of their partners by listening the phone calls. The US District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia penalized the makers of such a stalker app on the charges that an app of this kind would breach the privacy of its users and it can also be misused by some people. The court charged a fine of $A587,000 to Hammad Akbar. The court charged him against breaking the law, though unknowingly, in selling and promoting the StealthGenie app which would help its users to monitor and speculate the activities of the people who have installed this app in their phones (Bowker, et al., 2014). Discussion on ethical values People all over the world can see the rapid growth of the Information Technology industry. Information revolution has taken place in most countries of the world that has affected the lives of the people on the whole. This revolution in the Information Technology industry has affected the fields of medicine, employment, commerce, entertainment and transportation significantly in the recent times. As a consequence the communication and information technology (ICT) has affected the social community in both ways good and bad. The family and community life has improved with the betterment of the ICT, along with careers, education, human relationships and democracy. There are certain social and professional ethics and values associated with the ICT (Daft, 2012). The essay discusses the two different ethical theories on the light of the article of The Sydney Herald. One such theory is the theory of Just Consequentialism. The ethical theory of just consequentialism was developed in 1999 by James H. Moor. James developed this ethical theory to solve the ethical problems related to computer networks and computers. The core values which James had considered while formulating this theory involves the things that people and community gives the most importance to, such as resources, security, health, knowledge, oppurtunities and happiness. Consequentialism involves a wide variety of ethical systems. There is a common link between all these ethical systems. All the ethical systems involved in Consequentialism depends on the idea that actions that are morally correct depends on the results of that action or something related to that action. Another system of ethics on which the theory of Consequentialism depends is the Deontological Ethics developed b y Bernard Gert in 1998. This provides just constraints on consequalism and provides moral impartiality (McCaughey Ayers, 2013). The charges that the US District court has brought against Hammad stand correct if it is seen from the Just Consequentialism point of view. The actions of Hammad do not stand on the ethical and moral values. The app which he had created is used to track the whereabouts of the person whose phone has this app installed. It breaches the freedom of privacy among its users. The acts of the maker of the app were very wrong as this would have a negative impact on the society as a whole. Hence the punishment that the court awarded to Hammad was very much justified. The next important theory of ethics that the author wants to discuss here is the Utilitarian theory. The theory of utilitarianism is a normative ethical theory that lay emphasis on the idea of wrong or right depending solely on the choice of one policy or action among a group of other course of actions. The ethical theory gives more importance to the interest of others than ones own interest (Purtilo Doherty, 2015). The principal of utility proposed by Bentham includes the following aspects: Indentifies the role of pleasure and pain in the lives of human Disapproval or approval of the course of action depending on the amount of pleasure or pain that it brings along. Association of good and evil with pleasure and pain respectively Assertion of the quantification nature of pain and pleasure (Star, 2016). Bentham also includes the criterion of nearness or farness, uncertainty or certainty, duration or intensity in his principle of utilitarianism. The actions that are associated with the number of people affected by it are also accounted for their extent (Quinn, 2014). John Stuart Mill emphasized on some other aspects of the Utilitarianism theory. He argued that the quality of happiness is the central idea of utilitarianism, rather than the quantity of pleasure as proposed by Bentham. John is of the view that qualities cannot be measured or quantified. According to John, utilitarianism emphasizes on the goal of achieving greater pleasures for a large number of people (Schwalbe, 2015). The US District court has punished the accused on the grounds of violating the ethical theory of Utilitarianism. By creating such an app for tracking the locations of people using that app, he may hurt the sentiments of some people. The actions of Hammad may give immense pain to some people. Some other may highly benefit from this app. This may form some amount disparity among people living peacefully in the society. Hence it is very justified on the part of the court to impose fine on the maker of the app. Conclusion The article of The Sydney Herald which the author analyzes in the essay ascertains the fact that the US District Court can rightly punish any accused who tampers with the law. The article highlights the fact that any individual who breaks the law or breaks the ethical norms would be punished by the Court. The article gives a message to the society that every person is equal in the eyes of law. References: Bowker, G., Star, S. L., Gasser, L., Turner, W. (2014).Social science, technical systems, and cooperative work: Beyond the great divide. Psychology Press. Daft, R. 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