IT and Ethics

1. IT and Ethics Lecture 6 Codes of Ethics/Conduct Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

2. Professional ethics • Are IT professionals ”professionals”? • Lawyers, journalists and Medical personnel, especially doctors, have ethical codes • Lawyers: • Duty to defend the customer • Sometimes difficult, if no trust in the innocense of the customer Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

3. Professional ethics • Medical personnel • Ethical codes • Thought during schooling • Laws are not seen to be enough • Of course, unethical behaviour also to be found here, but the idea • Journalists • Truthful stories • Ethical codes and institutions to govern them (julkisen sanan neuvosto) Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

4. David K. McGraw (2004) A Social Contract Theory Critique of Professional Codes of Ethics Professionals? • Are we in a comparative field? • Are professional ethics in IT needed? • Who makes these codes? The professionals… • Power in society is a key issue, all the three mentioned previously have direct power over others • IT professionals generally have indirect power, but quite lot of it • Consider doctors working without computers—we make most of the gadgets they use now • Same applies to lawyers and journalists, and to (almost) anyone for that matter Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

5. http://www.info.fundp.ac.be/~jbl/IFIP/Ethics_and_Internet_Governance.pdfhttp://www.info.fundp.ac.be/~jbl/IFIP/Ethics_and_Internet_Governance.pdf http://www.info.fundp.ac.be/~jbl/IFIP/Criteria_and_procedures.pdf International codes of ethics • IFIP code of ethics (proposed) • For all IFIP member organizations • Now guide lines being built for items to be considered when coming up with a code • ACM code of ethics (well, American, but members from all around the world) • Widely known, used as draft for other codes; not really an international code • Various versions over the years • Early codes claimed of being male-dominating (Vehviläinen) • IEEE code Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

6. National codes of ethics/conduct • TTL ry / FIPA (Tietotekniikan Liitto / Finnish Information Processing Association) – code of ethics http://www.tt-tori.fi/ • BCS (British Computer Society) – code of conduct http://www1.bcs.org.uk/ • As examples Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

7. Scattered organizations • Some countries do not have central organizations for all IT professionals • Security people • Information people • Programmers • Etc. • Belgium and France as examples Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

8. What do the codes actually say? • Are the codes of ethics too generic? • Are they worth anything? • Do they say anything that isn’t in the law anyway (and thus must be followed under sanctions)? • Are the codes of conduct too specific? • Can all the members be expected to agree with them? • What if they don’t? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

9. Are the codes ethical? • Are they too binding? • Are they promoting • their creators subjective ethics? • society’s generally ‘accepted’ ethics? • Are they intellectually and emotionally balanced? • What about gender issues – Are these taken into account in them? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

10. Who knows that codes of ethics exist? • Members? • Survey in class (old): 2 out of 8ish • IT professionals (even if not members)? • Survey in class (new): 4 out of 12ish • IT companies? • Society at large? • Hardly Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

11. Who cares about their existence? • According to my personal (rather subjective) empirical testing: Noone. • Most members of TTL ry do not even know that TTL ry has an ethics code • Of those who do, most find them funny – they claimedly do not match reality Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

12. What if a member disagrees with the code? • Should the code be followed none the less? • Should the codes themselves be generic enough to be able to be followed? • ”Do good, do no evil”? • Would these be of any use? • Have all members implicitly agreed to follow the code by being members of the FIPA? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

13. Following the code • What if a member does follow the code, and finds themselves in trouble, e.g. unemployed due to it? • Should the organizations back the members up? • How? • Legal fees? • Monetary help? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

14. Not following the code • What if a member doesn’t follow the code? • Should there be sanctions? • If, what kinds of sanctions? • Expelled from the organization? • For organization members fees to be paid? • Stamp ”FIPA Ethics Partner” be revoked? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

15. Codes of conduct as usability guidelines • Claimed to produce better products • Could actually produce very good results, but, • Very expensive, if meeting all the needs of the group • Drive the business out of business if it was ‘perfect’ (what ever that is – is it even if possible) or at the least slow down sales which then would mean cuts in personnel etc. Oliver K Burmeister and John Weckert (2003) Applying the New Software Engineering Code of Ethics to Usability Engineering: A Study of Four Cases Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems

16. Demonstration case • Think of a few ethical rules that you would include in a code of ethics • Do you think that (all/most) other people (relativism…) would agree with them? • If yes, why? • If not, why? Kai Kimppa, IT Department, Information Systems