On the Conflicts of a Universal Computer Code of Ethics Abstract: The difficulty of having one global ethical Standard of Conduct for computer professionals is due to the fact that there are conflicting legitimate loyalties and interests. This paper examines an ethical issue in the professional computer world through use of a case study. The example given is that of a programmer who is asked to install new software on his computer. He notices that the software may have been illegally obtained, and investigates. After no one can prove to him that the software has a legitimate or illegitimate origin, he is faced with the dilemma of overlooking the problem or blowing the whistle and bringing it into the public sphere. The Code of Ethics of a typical computer company is examined for clues as to what ethical action the worker should take next. Ethical dilemmas can be difficult to resolve due to the nature of personal loyalties. We are all taught to abide by the law, listen to our parents, and be obedient to our employers. What if, however, one these loyalties come into conflict with each other? Our allegiance may suddenly fall into question. We may be forced to chose what is most important to us, making decisions that might change our relationship with our loyalties. The following case is an example of such an ethical dilemma, where an employee must first determine if in fact there is a conflict, and secondly what action to take if in fact the conflict exists. We use this case to analyze the inherent conflicts in having one Universal Code of Ethics for computer professionals. In this analysis, we focus on the ethical conflicts and do not consider problems arising due to technical specialties or changes. Consider following fictional situation: Rawley works for a small internet consulting company which designs and implements web portals. He is an expert at implementing the back end of sites. One day, however, Rawley's manager asks him work on the design of the web site. His manager says that the project is behind schedule and needs more workers. He also promises that this will not become a long term project: it will last no more than a month. Since Rawley has done this kind of work for past employers, he does not think it will be hard to do here. He agrees to take on the job. To begin his new assignment, Rawley must install new software on his computer. He goes to the technical support team, and receives the software upon request. It is not, however, what he expected. Instead of an original disk, he receives a CD-R disk with the name of the program and the CD-key hand-written on top. Immediately Rawley is suspicious, and asks his coworkers who have installed this program before if they too used this copied disk. They had. Should Rawley at this point worry that the program has been illegally obtained? Or should he leave the responsibility of copyright infringement to the technical department? Not sure how to proceed, Rawley walks back to the technical support staff and asks about the disk. He is told that the copy is of an original that they have stored away. Fair enough, Rawley thinks, and asks for the original disk and documentation. The technical staff worker looks for the package, and comes back empty handed. Rawley is told that it must have gotten misplaced during the company's move to a new office six months before. Going back to his desk, Rawley thinks about the situation. Why was the original misplaced but the copy still around? Should he report this to his manager? Or because he does not have definite reason to suspect illegal activity, he ought to disregard his worries and install the software? Reasoning that it would not be harmful, Rawley goes to tell his manager of the situation. His manager, unfazed by the situation, quickly tells Rawley not to worry about it. He assures him that the original disk will eventually turn up, and that he should not waste any more time worrying about the situation. Thus the ethical dilemma is set: On one side, Rawley's company is unable to prove to him that the software is legal. To him, it seems that either no one really cares about copyright laws, or is trying to hide their involvement in stealing the software. And even if the disk was a copy of an original, does the company own enough licenses of the software to allow another user, Rawley, to use the program simultaneously with his coworkers? On the other hand, however, is Rawley only overreacting and unnecessarily worrying? It may very well be true that the disk is in fact a copy of an original, and that the company misplaced the original box during its move. And surely the company has enough licenses for its workers. And even if not, he is only on the project temporarily, and will no longer need the software after a month. Should the company really need to pay for another license of the software for such a short term project? There are probably workers who have the software but do not use it. Thus Rawley could temporarily use their license. And, at the same time, it is not his job to deal with issues of software piracy. He is not the technical staff that deal with such things, and he would not be punished if in fact a copyright infringement was proven. In order to evaluate Rawley's arguments in ethical terms, let us consider the Code of Ethics and Standards of Conduct as published by the Association of Information Technology Professionals (AITP).1 The AITP breaks the Code of Ethics down to four employee obligations: to management, to fellow members and the profession, to society, and to the employer. The following are selective excerpts from the Standard of Conduct of AITP that pertain to Rawley's ethical issue. As an obligation to management, Rawley is to "share his knowledge with others and present factual and objective information to management to the best of [his] ability." This obligation was fully followed. Rawley discussed the matter with his manager, telling him all the details that he was aware of in the situation. Here, he undoubtedly did the ethically correct thing. As an obligation to his employer, Rawley is to "avoid conflict of interest and insure that [his] employer is aware of any potential conflicts." Rawley did make his employer aware of a potential problem. It is safe to say that Rawley "[presented] a fair, honest, and objective viewpoint" to his manager while showing his concern for the legitimacy of the software. There are a several responsibilities that Rawley has to his fellow members and the profession as a computer professional. The first is to "be honest in all [] professional relationships." Rawley met this responsibility, since he did not hide from anyone that he was suspicious about the disk being illegally obtained. He also attempted to "cooperate with others in achieving understanding and in identifying problems." However, the people he spoke to, the technical staff and his manager, did not seem to take the issue seriously enough to take any action once the problem was identified. Rawley also had an obligation to "take appropriate action in regard to any illegal or unethical practices that [came] to [his] attention." Is there enough evidence to take action against the company? This is the dilemma that Rawley is trying to resolve. His obligation to society is to "support, respect, and abide by the appropriate local, state, provincial, and federal laws." If the software was obtained illegally, installing it would be breaking these laws. Secondly, Rawley is to "never misrepresent or withhold information that is germane to a problem or situation of public concern." It is obvious that if in fact laws were broken obtaining the software, this point shows that not bringing this situation to public light would be unethical. If it were not true, however, misrepresenting the company may prove unwelcome. We can see how Rawley must chose between his loyalty to society, and loyalty to his company. It is yet unclear whether the company did in fact infringe on copyright laws. It is obvious why Rawley is concerned. His decision may very well affect his future at his company. If he chooses to keep the discovery a secret, he would be acting unethically. If he brings the issue to light, though, he may either be falsely accusing his company, or bringing a lawsuit upon it. In both cases, Rawley may be compromising the position with his employer. Thus it is easy to share in Rawley's dilemma of conflicting loyalties. 1 Bowyer, Kevin W. "Ethics and Computing: Living Responsibly in a Computerized World." Second Edition. IEEE Press: New York, 2001; pages 47-50.
Hughes sought quantity while the whistleblower was focused on the quality of the product. The unethical standpoint of Hughes disregarded the required quality of product that they were supposed to create. Goodearl, from a standpoint of virtue ethics, a tradition within philosophical ethics that seeks a full and detailed description of those character traits, or virtues, that would constitute a good and full human life,(Hartman, p. 123) could not let her integrity be compromised by knowingly passing faulty products. Within this conflict of interests, and before resorting to whistleblowing, Goodearl attempted to handle the situation within the company but met resistance. With threats of retaliation as far a threats of being fired and on her status as not being a legal resident and the consequences of losing her job. Her approach to the situation should be seen as ethical even in a utilitarian perspective as she sought to do the greatest good both for the agencies receiving the products as well as letting the issue be handled internally so there would be less harm done to the company itself. When this approach had been exhausted and met with resistance at each occurrence, was when the path of becoming a whistleblower was taken. At this point it should still be seen as an ethical decision due to the fact that she had attempted multiple times to handle the situation for the greatest
Within a company, illegal practices can be seen by many as the “in thing” and the people working within that environment may not see what they are doing as morally wrong. The issue of the lack of media coverage of these types of crimes must also not be overlooked.
Part of the issue is that software is somewhat invisible and creeps up in all sorts of places-often as an aid to those in strictly-licensed professions.
Consider the following scenario; Billy works in the IT department for Cadmus Labs, a genetic research laboratory in Washington, DC. Billy was the best in the field and was soon asked to assist on a top secret project called Project 13. He immediately accepted the promotion and felt honored to be given such an amazing opportunity. However, within a month of working on the project, Billy discovered that the project’s goal was to create a super weapon as a duplicate and closest genetic equivalent of Superman in an effort to destroy Superman. Billy was outraged and refused to continue work on the project. He then went on to report the information that he gathered to the government so the project could be stopped. Was Billy ethical in his actions?
Tyco provides products and services across the world. The company is global and diversified providing a variety of products including electronics, healthcare, fire and security services and engineered products and services. While employing over 250,000 people worldwide they grossed approximately $40 billion in revenue in the year 2005. In 2002 Tyco was involved with the corporate scandal where the management mis-appropriated corporation funds. The previous CEO Dennis Kozlowski was convicted in 2005 on 22 counts of the 23 that he was charged with. This is an example of not only a legal issue of responsibility but also one of an ethical issue that the Tyco Corporation has had to face. In the face of the legal and ethical issues that this mishap had placed the corporation in, Tyco placed Ed Breen in as chairman and CEO. Mr. Breen joined the company in 2002 after the scandal and immediately began the rebuild of the company’s name. With the appointment of Ed Breen and his changing of the company’s ethical standards (to be discussed in the next portion of the paper) he promotes the legal responsibilities of not only the company’s employees but the responsibilities of the suppliers and buyers to report any wrong doing. This reporting also speaks to the ethics of the Tyco corporation employees as well as those of the companies th...
This case is an example of something which a decade earlier would never have even been considered to be illegal. But, it falls into in of the heavily opposed section 12013 of the new Digital Millenium Copyright Act which tries to halt circumvention of anti-piracy measures. There was opposition before the law passed, but it became stronger when the DVD CAA tried to oppress distribution of the DeCSS - code that could bypass the encryption used on DVDs.4
In today’s world of connected computers, ethics plays a very important role in ensuring that ICT professionals maintain their integrity. Philip Argy, the President of the Australian Computer Society, was quoted saying in 2007 that ethics is “doing the right thing even when no one is looking” (Worthington 2008). James Moor, who wrote a paper titled “What is Computer Ethics?” in 1985, summarised that with computers being universal tools, it has enabled us to do things that we could have never been able to do before. Since prior to this, we could not do these tasks, it was never a question whether one should use the computer to do such a task.
Everyone in this world has experienced an ethical dilemma in different situations and this may arise between one or more individuals. Ethical dilemma is a situation where people have to make complex decisions and are influenced based on personal interest, social environment or norms, and religious beliefs (“Strategic Leadership”, n.d.). The leaders and managers in the company should set guidelines to ensure employees are aware and have a better chance to solve and make ethical decisions. Employees are also responsible in understanding their ethical obligations in order to maintain a positive work environment. The purpose of this case study is to identify the dilemma and analyze different decisions to find ways on how a person should act
The commercial value of all that unlicensed software totalled more than $51 billion.” (Business Software Alliance) They also said that the impact of software piracy goes beyond the revenues lost to the software industry. Local software distributors are hurt and cannot create jobs, and they also cannot generate tax revenues for governments. From this study, “The Economic Benefits of Reducing Software Piracy” documents were created. Their main findings are as follows:
Sticking with her first gut instinct to turn in her finding despite knowing her boss wouldn’t be satisfied with her work. Instead she will inform the content of her finding to the CEO of the company. And if he also is angered by data presented to him it is better for her to take this current loss and quit. Knowing wisely that her current action will define her work ethic for the rest of her career. Nobody in the future will want to hire a dishonest person, especially a dishonest engineer. Stephanie is not a 16-year-old teenager lying about stolen items in McDonalds. She is a chemical engineer; her actions do way more than just affect herself. Engineers are the hands that mold the greatest aspects of society into place. Without them society will be hauled into a standstill. With that being said we them to act accordingly and morally to their
Forester, T. M. (1994). Computer Ethics : Cautionary Tales and Ethical Dilemmas in Computing. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press.
Computer ethics is about principles related to behavior and decisions made by computer professionals and users, including software engineers, operators, managers, policy makers, as well as educators and students. This means all these people involved should be supported with some "policies for ethical conduct" i.e. policies that guide their actions and increase adequacy of the decisions they make. (Szejko par. 1) With the rapid infusion of computers, software and related technologies into homes, schools and businesses, we initially focused our energies on learning about the technologies and how to use them. We now need to focus our attention on the ethical issues surrounding technology to insure that we and our children understand and practice values important to all of us; respect for others, their property, ownership, and the right to privacy. (Alden par. 4)
Duquenoy, P., Jones, S., & Blundell, B. (2008). Ethical, legal and professional issues in computing. London: Thomson.
Having been employed and dedicated to this company for ten years, one of the hardest things the writer had to do, was to forgive the owners. In fact, they were deceptive in the way they handled this situation. Yes, the flesh wanted to rule and reign and not show compassion or forgiveness; but thanks to the Word of God that was hidden in the writer’s heart, Christians values were upheld. Luke 6:35 states, “But love your enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High. For He is kind to the unthankful and evil
In this section, we will discuss about the usage of computer in a wrong ways which violates the computer ethics. First of all, unethical behaviour is an act that should not be done by someone as it can bring many disadvantages. These behaviours can be done by everyone in this world, for example, engineer, doctor, professionals, prime minister in their politician and in businessman. Unethical behaviour is depending on the level of someone’s discipline.