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Fundamentals of Digital Skills Week 7

Polytechnic Foundation Program
Academic Year 2022/23 Semester 2 Session 1
Data Privacy & Computer Ethics

Name: __________________________

Objectives

 Students will have a better understanding of data privacy;

 Students are better able to distinguish between “Ethical” and “Legal”
 Understand what is meant by computer ethics

Activities

1. Read the Stacy Snyder case reproduced below from the slide.
Title: Social Networking Sites and Privacy Issues

Stacy Snyder, a former student at Millersville University of Pennsylvania,

posted a photo of herself on social media that showed her wearing a pirate’s
hat while drinking. The photo was captioned “Drunken Pirate”. Although
Snyder was of legal drinking age at the time, Millersville administrators
considered the image unprofessional and refused to grant her a degree in
education and a teaching certificate. Instead, she was given a degree in
English. Did the university violate Stacy’s privacy?

In 2017, Harvard withdrew acceptances of several prospective students due to

offensive posts on social media.
These cases illustrate the seriousness of offensive behavior on social media,
and students and young adults, should become educated on social media
etiquette and understand the consequences of their actions.

i. How do you feel about Stacy Snyder’s behavior?

I feel that stacy behavior is inappropriate as this might affect her own self image. She
should know the consequences of digital footprints

FDS 2022/23 Semester 2 Last update: 15/04/2022

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ii. Was the university right to take the actions that they have taken in refusing
to grant her the appropriate degree and the teaching certificate? Explain
briefly your response.

Yes, this might affect the university’s reputations.

2. Many homes have installed smart devices like Amazon.com Echo and Google
Home to play music and have access to “intelligent homes” capabilities like
ordering things and control home lighting. With these devices, you are able to
give verbal commands to these devices to do things but at the same time,
your home conversations may be recorded.

i. Would you like to have this type of device installed in your home? Explain.

Yes. It is useful especially for people like me as I don’t have to physically close the
lights. With this, it will be much more convenient.

ii. How do you feel about your conversations being recorded and stored in
the vendor’s computer system? Briefly describe your response.

I will feel uncomfortable because information has been recorded and people might
hack to obtain information.

3. The activity in Slide 15: Ethical versus Legal Grid is reproduced here.

LEGAL ILLEGAL
Ethical I, III

Unethical V IV, I

In which quadrant does each of the following scenario fall into?

FDS 2022/23 Semester 2 Last update: 15/04/2022

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i. You make 2 copies of a software package you just bought and sold to a
friend.

ii. You make 2 copies of a software package you just bought for personal
use, the copy is for backup.

iii. A banker uses the information of a client enters in a loan application to sell
other financial products to this client.

iv. A credit card company sells its customers’ mailing addresses to its
competitors

v. A supervisor fires a programmer who has intentionally spread viruses to

the organization’s network.

4. Due to the rapid spread of infection from the coronavirus, the Singapore
government has instructed all public food places to put patrons at a “safe
distance” from each other. Hawkers and food providers have thus marked
neighboring seats with a “X” to indicate that the seat should not be used.
Soon after, there was this message that was circulated and gone viral in
WhatsApp chat groups. [Note: this is a real story but happened at the
beginning of the Circuit Breaker period in March/April 2020]

The screenshot:

i. Why was this message circulated by whoever had composed it?

They were furious as they were fined. Hence, they want to help the other people
from getting fined.

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ii. Do such messages help or “confuse” the citizens during this crisis period?
Explain your response.

No, some of the information may not be certainly true. It is better to get information
from reliable sources.

5. Submission

Submission of work:

a. Save and upload all the completed activities as advised by your tutors.

b. You should have submitted a total of 1 file:

XX – MyName – Data Privacy and Computer Ethics.docx

where XX – refers to your class register number

And MyName refers to your name in NPAL

FDS 2022/23 Semester 2 Last update: 15/04/2022

Week 7 Session 1