Ethics

A post about Ethics from the BCS "IT industry 'must get serious' about ethics" http://bit.ly/WsTyyG  which highlights the IT industry should get serious about ethics. This post was based on Andrea Di Maio blog "It Is Time for Industry, Government and Consumers To Get Serious About IT Ethics" http://bit.ly/QWluKL

I found Andrea's blog very interesting as I have been involved in teaching of ethics to university students and covering it in Information Security course and it is also covering in the (ISC)2 CISSP body of knowledge. In particular refer to consumers is a good point when you consider that ethics are the moral principles that govern a person's or group's behaviour and in terms of code of ethics of all professional institutions they refer to not only working towards the general good of the professional body but of society in general.

The blog makes some very good points and gives some interesting examples to illustrate those points, the comments by Bill McCluggage at the end of the blog are also interesting, I look forward to more from both Andrea and Bill as it will form some good background for my activities.

I can see in the blog the line of reasoning that started with Norbert Wiener, his work was in the area of "Loss of human control and oversight" and his article "A Scientist Rebels" for the January 1947 issue of The Atlantic Monthly urged scientists to consider the ethical implications of their work. I personally think that in particular with IT it has great affect on society and all the stakeholders, Industry, Government and Consumers in the words of Andrea Di Maio need to be involved in ensuring that IT ethics are taken seriously.