Information (Data) ethics

Ahmad Kipacha
Module 3
 ICT Ethics
• Information and Communication Technology (ICT) includes
computers, the Internet, and electronic delivery systems
such as radios, televisions, and projectors among others,
• Set of moral principles which guide users on how to use
computers in morally acceptable manner.
• Addresses issues of responsibility, obligations,
accountability, liability, ownership and Intellectual Property
Rights, Quality of system , environment and quality of life
 The evolution of the Information
Ethics (EI)
Norbert Wiener (father of cybernetics), in the late 1940s and
early 1950s, was the first to predict and work on such
problems.
The term “Computer ethics” was coined by Walter Maner in
the mid 1970s, to refer to the field of research that
studies ethical problems “aggravated, transformed or
created by computer technology”.
Later, it became clear that what matters is not the specific
technology (computers, mobiles, ICTs in general) but the
raw material manipulated by it, data/information. So in
the late 1990s several researchers, especially in Oxford,
started working on “information ethics” (IE).
Should we be speaking of data ethics ?
• ICT has stream of ethical issues around
– AI ethics
– ML ethics
– Robotic ethics
– Big data ethics
– 5G ethics etc?
 4IR consequences –DATA Ethics
• Data ethics can be defined as the branch of ethics that
studies and evaluates moral problems related to:
• data (including generation, recording, curation,
processing, dissemination, sharing and use),
• algorithms (including artificial intelligence, artificial
agents, machine learning and robots)
• corresponding practices (including responsible
innovation, programming, hacking and professional
codes)
• in order to formulate and support morally good
solutions (e.g. right conducts or right values)
 Current Research Agenda
• Ethics vs AI –machine learning
• Ethics vs robotics
• Ethics vs big data
• Ethics vs IoT
• Ethics vs Drone
• Ethics vs Cybersecurity
• Information warfare
• Ethical hacking
• Social engineering
• 5G
 What Raises Computer Ethical
Issues?
• Trend impact Computing power doubles
• Dependence on computer systems
• Massive Data open for analysis
• Networking advances
• Copying & accessing data from one location to
another
• Mobile device impact
 ICT changing the way we shop
• Jobs transferred
abroad
• High street shops not
being able to
compete with
Internet stores
• Gig economy
 Ethical issues due to ICT
• Employers looking at job
applicants’ social networking
profiles
• Employers monitoring employees’
emails, websites visited, etc.
• Invasion of privacy by social
networking sites
• Use of cookies to record websites
visited without you knowing
 Moral issues due to ICT
• Copying of copyrighted
material
• Widening of gap
between rich and poor
countries
• bitcoin
 Social issues due to ICT
• Lack of privacy
• Addictions to social
networking sites,
chat rooms, etc.
• Addictions to games,
gambling, etc.
• Addiction to
pornography
 Challenges to Privacy

• Cookies:
• Tiny files deposited on a hard drive
• Used to identify the visitor and track visits to the
Web site
• May or may not be used to gather personal
private information
• In some cases, only a visitors customer number
is maintained, not any personal information. In
other cases, personal information can be
gathered
 No privacy
• Privacy issues have been around for ages.
• With technological development,
possibilities for privacy invasion increased
very much
• What did you buy, where, when, how
much; phone calls; what did you eat;
where did you go for holidays,…)
• Privacy issues are at the top of the list in
regards to ethical use of information.
• Loss of control
• Misuse of information
• Risk to physical privacy
• Risk of identity theft (video)
• Unwanted intrusions into daily life
 Ethical dilemma with privacy
issues

• Under what conditions should the privacy of others

be invaded?

• What legitimates intruding into others’ lives through

unobtrusive surveillance, through market research, or
by whatever means?
• Do we have to inform people that we are
eavesdropping?
• Do we have to inform people that we are using credit
history information for employment screening
purposes?
 Ethical Hacking
• What so ethical in hacking?

• Hackers are labeled “ethical” or “white

hat” when they are hired by their victims
to discover security vulnerabilities and
improve the victim’s cybersecurity
 Policy vacuums
• According to James Moor, when computers create
new possibilities, there is a vacuum of policies.
• Filling the policy vacuum involves sorting out what
Moor refers to as conceptual muddles. (ex: at the
beginning, fitting computer software to prevailing
intellectual property law – copyright and patent
seemed best possibilities.)
• ethical analysis can have an important role in
critiquing policies that have already formed,
pointing to their misfit with notions of justice or
responsibility or good consequences.
 Applying ethical theories in ICT
• 3 types
• Virtues > “duty” or “obligation” (good person)
(teleology)
• Rights > right action(deontological)
• Consequentialism (utilitarianism) welfare/
utility
 Data Mining
• Data-mining advances: Increases the ability of
firms and governments to track the
movement of citizens throughout life
 Big data ethics
• Using huge databases to aggregate consumer
information, reducing the costs of granting
credit, but increasing the chance of losing
personal data to criminals, terrorists, or others
 AI
• Can improve various aspects of healthcare
• It can help reduce annual expenditure
• allow early detection of diseases
• provide round-the clock monitoring for
chronic disorders
• can help limit the exposure of healthcare
professionals in contagious environments.
 The Use of AI
• in healthcare systems in Africa, in particular,
can eliminate inefficiencies such as
misdiagnosis, shortage in healthcare workers,
and wait and recovery time.
• However, it is important to safeguard against
issues such as privacy breaches, or lack of
personalised care and accessibility.
• policymakers can strike a balance between
allowing innovation and protecting data.
How Cookies Identify Web
Visitors
Web bugs:
• Tiny graphic files embedded in e-mail messages and
Web pages. When the user views the e-mail, or views
the page, a message is sent to the server, or to a third-
party server without the knowledge of the user.

• Designed to monitor online Internet user behavior. In

the case of e-mail, the e-mail address is known to the
server.
 Challenges: Web Design
• Implementation of features
– Pop ups
– Blocking/filters
– Aliases and redirecting
– Cookies
– Privacy policies
– Security policies
– Spyware
– WEB BUG

• Use of other design features

– Javascript
– Graphics - pictures, buttons, logos, icons
– Content
– Design layout
– Accountability/responsibility
– Outdated material, inaccurate material

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Spyware/malware:

• Typically downloaded by file-sharing programs like

Kazaa, who make money selling advertising to large
consumer products, retailing, and clothing
companies.
Q.2

What do you think works

best to protect the privacy of
individuals?
 Cybercrime & Abuse
• Computer crime: Commission of illegal acts
through the use of a computer or against a
computer system is on the increase.

• Is Spam legal? How about phishing to defraud

people? Spam and phishing crimes are the fastest
growing Internet fraud.

• Computer abuse: Unethical but not necessarily

illegal acts.
• Deserted shopping
centres
• Health problems
• Paedophiles looking
for their next victim
• Identity theft
• False rumours
• Misinformation
 • THE CYBERCRIMES ACT, 2015
• An Act to make provisions for criminalizing offences
related to computer systems and Information
Communication Technologies; to provide for
investigation collection, and use of electronic
evidence and for matters related there with.

https://rsf.org/sites/default/files/the_cyber_crime_act_
2015.pdf
What are the motivation?
• Vendetta/Revenge
• Joke/Hoax/Prank
• The Hacker's Ethics
• All information should be free
• Terrorism
• Political and Military Espionage
• Business ( Competition) Espionage
• Hate (national origin, gender, and race)
• Personal gain/Fame/Fun/Notoriety
• Ignorance
 Challenges in Tracking Cyber
Criminals
• Nearly in all countries there is no required reporting
mechanism in government agencies, even the private
sector, to detect intrusions and report such intrusions
• In the private sector, there is very little interest in
reporting of any system related intrusions. This is a
result of the fear of marketplace forces that would
expose management’s weaknesses to the shareholder
community and competitors.
 Challenges: Commerce
• Fraud
• Taxation
• Free Trade
• Gambling
• Auctions
• Spamming
– Who were Canter and Siegel?
– Spamming cell phones?
• Term papers for sale
– Atlanta Journal Constitution article

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 Challenges: Workplace
• Accessibility
• Ergonomics
• Outsourcing
• Telecommuting
• Customer relationships – Vendor relationships
• Should IT professionals be in the ethics business or should other areas of
the business handle these issues?

• Monitoring
– Should your employer have the right to monitor private email messages?
– What are the two most popular Web sites for American workers? Playboy and
ESPN

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 Challenges: intellectual Property
• Electronic Copyright
• Licensing
• Interoperability
• Licensing
– Cyberlicenses
– Shrinkwrap
– Shareware
– Freeware
• MP3
– RIAA court case against college students
– University Internet Usage policies
• Internet Downloads
– Files
– Graphics
– Text

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 Challenges: Intellectual Property

• Patent, trade secrets, and copyright law

– Who owns the program
– Who owns the algorithm
• Software Piracy
– Why shouldn't I use pirated software? Who am I hurting by doing
so?
– Piracy exists in everywhere.
– Loss of revenue hurts everyone.
– All software piracy is illegal and Software piracy is unethical.

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 Students Activity 2: Independent
Studies

• Familialize your self with Cyber Crime Act 2015

What are common offences that are done in your
area?
• Should a device, a technique or technology be
restricted because people can use it for illegal or
harmful actions as well as beneficial ones?
Ethical issues Behind 5G

• 5G is new technology, accompanied by so

many controversies.
• Proponent of 5G tend to abide to
Utilitarianism, whilst
• Exponent of tend to align to Ontology of
5G.
5G Exponent Ethical Arguments
– According to the group of in 2017, a group of 255 EU
scientist signed a partition to EU against the
deployment of 5G.
https://emfscientist.org/index.php/emf-scientist-
appeal

– Their argument was based on the ontology of 5G, in

which it leaves human to be exposed to Non-ionizing
Electromagnetic Field.

– Remember 5G requires numerous towers, emitting

high frequency waves.
 5G Proponent Ethical Arguments
• Economy and Business.
– It will improve industries performance, creates
jobs, and more economical opportunities.
• Ergonomics
– Improving working and technology use
• IOT, ROBOT
– 5G will enhance the performance, and
introduction of IOT in our daily lives
 5G Proponent Ethical Arguments
• 5G will revolutionize every aspect of our live. An
benefiting the whole world.

• Equality and Fairness

– It bring access to many services that were barred to
them due to distance and cost issues.
– It will unlock a lot of economical potential to many
individuals.
– Efficient and uniform platform: It will allow
interoperability among electronic devices
manufactures.
5G Exponent Ethical Arguments
– These magnetic fields results into:
– Increased cancer risk, cellular stress, increase in
harmful free radicals, genetic damages.
– Structural and functional changes of the
reproductive system, learning and memory
deficits, neurological disorders, and negative
impacts on general well-being in humans.
– Damage goes well beyond the human race, as
there is growing evidence of harmful effects to
both plant and animal life.
5G Exponent Ethical Arguments
– 5G will results into more emphasis into robots
instead of human.

– Robots will take many aspects of our lives, like no

more drivers, cleaners, nurses, doctors, friends,
companions etc.

– It may results into more selfish, egoism, and self

worship
5G Exponent Ethical Arguments
– 5G will results into more data. How are we going to
ensure the safety of these data, we may end up in a
data controlled world.

– Furthermore: What would happened in case of

cyberattacks to IOT devices. May be locked cities?,
– How about hospital and health care?,
– Banking?, washing machine?.

Just think being locked in out of your residence by unknown

agent.
 What is 5G
• According to IEEE (The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers)
5G is a collection wireless technologies
1. Millimeter Waves
2. Small Cell
3. Massive MIMO
4. Beamforming
5. Full-Duplex
 What is 5G: (1.) Millimeter Waves

• These are extremely high frequency waves

that can be propagated.
• It is a supper fast in terms of data
transmission.
 What is 5G: (2.) Small Cell

• There is existence of varieties of small cells.

• All have varying range and power level based

on their usability.
What is 5G: (2.) Small Cell
 What is 5G: (3.) Millimeter Waves

• MIMO(Multiple‐Input Multiple‐Output )
It is a multiple antenna technique used in wireless
communication.
Thus Massive MIMO is a large scale MIMO.

• The Massive-MIMO is more accurate technology, with

little distortion of signal.

• However, for it to function properly it must relies on

personal on numerous antennas, unlike the current 4G.
 What is 5G: (4.) Beamforming

• It is a technique that focuses a wireless signal

towards a specific receiving device.
• Rather than having the signal spread in all
directions from a broadcast antenna, as it
normally would.
• The resulting more direct connection is faster
and more reliable than it would be without
beamforming.
 Q3
• Based on the description we have made
so far, its obvious that there are core and
supporting technologies in 5G. Kindly
categorize between the technologies
mentioned into supportive and core
technologies.
 Any resolution
• Unfortunately, none.
• Proponent of 5G accuses the exponent of 5G of
fear mongering, and creating attention.
• Exponent accuses the proponent of seeking
financial, fame, and profits gains.
• How about you?Are you the proponent or the
exponent?
 Key references
• What is data ethics? Floridi L & M Taddeo
2016
 blogs
• Diplo 2021
• ‘AI’s ethical and human rights implications.
• issues are: fairness, bias, privacy, discrimination,
automation, inequalities, predictive policing,
social scoring, and autonomous weapons.
• AI posed serious threats to human rights online
and offline, as well as growing ethical challenges.
• To fully benefit humanity, significant measures
are needed, combining positive encouragement
and stricter rules.’