Ethics and Information Security

Ethics and Online Source Information

What is Ethics?

In my opinion, ethics give people free will to make right choices. People have free will to make choices that are governed with responsibility, accountability, and liability. We have a responsibility to perform in an ethical manner and be accountable for our choices or actions. Regardless of the circumstances and choices we make, there are consequences if we make the wrong choice. The question of whether an action or choice is ethical or not is fundamentally based on whether something is right or wrong. From an ethical standpoint, unethical choices and risky behavior can lead to increased liabilities. The liabilities result in the loss or damage sustained by a company or other party as result of an unethical and sometimes illegal decision. Although we exercise free will on a continuous basis, we are governed by the decisions we make and my belief is that the decisions we make daily do not just affect us. These decisions affect other people, such as family, friends, coworkers, instructors, neighbors, etc. The most prominent example of ethics can be recognized in the field of technology based on the growing amount of rapidly changing legislation and acts that under consideration in order to protect people from unethical practices.

One of the most recent examples of ethics and technology conflicts in the United States are privacy issues and how we cite, distribute and publish intellectual property on the internet. For instance, many corporations and people take advantage of the open access of the internet and the lack of legislation governing the right to post and upload information to the internet. Today, nearly every household in the United States has a computer with int...

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...t for illegally profit, the consequences will be unfavorable; therefore, a decision has to be made in order to protect the rights of the original owner and the responsible party must be held responsible for any infractions.

What are the disadvantages of not having the laws in places?

The lack of legislation after a number of major incidents including government security breaches would prove to be devastating. A state of mass chaos and uncertainty would uproot all across the globe and there would not be any need for lawyers, GBI’s, FBI’s, jails, prisons, nor courthouses. Without laws in place, everything we face today would get increasingly worse and lead to a number of violent retaliations. The death toll would increase to astronomical proportions and the glaring need for control and monitoring would become more and more evident as each incident unfolds.