Ethics and Information Technology

IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System Importance of ethics among the IT professional Abstract: In work environment, ethics is the common rules or approach for all professionals need to obey in order to achieve a great environment in an organization. Most of people think that ethics and morals is something that share the same meaning but actually they are not. The morals are towards the personal character, while ethics stress a social system in which those morals are applied. In other words, ethics point to standards or codes of behaviours expected by the group to which the individual belongs.The ethics might be national ethics, social ethics, company ethics, professional ethics, or even family ethics. So while a person’s moral code is usually unchanging, the ethics of he or she practices can be others to depend on. This paper is written based on data collection from many sources such as webs, articles, and books. So, this paper will provide an overview on the i mportance of ethics among the IT professionals. Furthermore, it will be explaining the beneficial of applying ethics to IT professionals in order to achieve a good relationship among the workers or team members in an organization.Keyword: Importance of ethics, Ethics, Morals, IT professionals P/S : ABSTRACT N REFERENCE LUM SIAP†¦ nak check semula nanti .. nie lum check lagi. 1 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System 1. 0 Introduction Nowadays, as we know that, information technology becomes the famous things in the world because most of technology makes our work become clear and it is very useful to the people in order to manage or do something. It is very unique of information technology like mobile device, computer, and so on because it is variety of used to the people directly make the people life more comfortable.But refer to the ethics of information technology professional, it can be seen that on how they used the technology, implement the information techno logy and built for it. In the short term definition, information technology is the technology that is used to process the data. Like nowadays, we used the computer devices to process the data within the organization or out of the organization or the company. Nevertheless, when we come up with the information technology professional, we will want to know the ethics I order to used the information technology either it is good ethics or the bad ethics.There, ethics is referring to the behavior or moral of the individual people in daily life. It is very crucial things that need to know because it can show the achievement of the individual or organization goals and objectives. Actually, ethics make us become more disciplines because we need to follow the rules and procedures of the organization. Ethics among information technology professional can be defines as the attitude of information technology professional in order to accomplish something based on their behavior. It is because base d on their behavior, it can show their successful either they can achieve the goals or not.It is depends on the level of ethics strangeness. Information technology professional must have high of motivation or ethics in them self because they faced with the information technology where they need facing on the information technology which can process the data that need to manage, analyze, design, implement, control, maintenance and storing. It is mostly referring to the hardware that is familiar to process the data or information like computer. As the information technology professional, sometimes they need to face with any challenges when their work in order to accomplish something work that need to be done.It is the problem that the information technology professional in their profession. When the challenges or any issues that they need to faced, information 2 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System technology professional need to try the best to find the solution to o vercome their problem and it is their roles and responsibilities. It is mostly refer to the ethics of information technology professional on how they handle some issues or any challenges in their work or job. 2. 0Methodology In completing this term paper, primary and secondary literatures are used to enable in depth understanding of the importance ethics among information technology professional. For the primary literatures in order to complete this term paper, mostly I used observation method by review all the article that is related to the ethics among information technology professional. Besides that, I used secondary data where I refer to the sources that are related to the topic that I focused on such as books, article journals, internet sources and so on.From the primary and secondary literature, I know about the challenges that are faced by information technology professional and the issues that are come up today. From the challenges or the issues, information technology prof essional need to think on how to overcome the problem that they need to faced and find the alternative or the solution to overcome it. It is based on their behavior on how they can settle their problem. The primary and secondary literature method that are used, is very crucial thing to know on what happened among the information technology professional that are based on their behavior or ethics. IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System 3. 0 Definitions and concept of ethics There are various definitions of ethics. According to the Britz, J. J. which come from department of Information Science University of Pretoria, he defines ethics as the individual action either good or bad and he told that ethics in the general term which make the people come as the fully human. He prefer to the use of technology that are threat to the right of privacy of a person. As a person, ethics is very importance thing in our daily activities.As we know that, ethics is referring to the variou s styles. Maybe, ethics might be as the national ethics, social ethics, company ethics, and family ethics and can be professional ethics. What is ethics? According to Sir Aristotle which is the famous philosopher, ethics is the custom, character or the habit of a person and in the simplest word; it can be defined as the system of the moral principles. It is worked out from human reason and experience by human action that determines either right or wrong. But, a sociologist like Dr.Raymond Baumhart said that ethics is can be divided into two divisions which is rights, obligations, benefit to the society, fairness of specifics virtue. It is refer to the moral beliefs. Secondly, ethics refer to the study and development of the standards of the ethical. So, ethics told that on how the people lead their lives and making the decisions. Today, we know that everybody needs to be fast and smart. For the information technology professional money is very importance thing but not in their caree r life.It is means that, career as the information technology professional will followed by their effort directly money is their reward on their effort. For the powerful organizations, information technology professional mostly refer to the ethics as the guidelines to achieve the goal of an organization. According to the Jefferson, guideline is crucial things because ethical principles that are provided will assist them in the many of the professional decisions they will make. Lacovino stated that ethics is the reasoned process but not just how we feel about something because it can be a habitual when we set a value to apply consistently.Some of the researcher defined the ethics as the agent where it refers to the agent processes or action. When we come up with the professional ethics, means that what the person who is professional should do or should not do within the organization or outside the organization. That are stated by Mclarty (2007) but Worthington (2008) told that in dev eloping any information 4 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System technology, professional ethical issues can be occur. Nowadays, the modern world, all the services like internet allow people to connect quickly to the information technology system.So, Worthington states that professionals are more likely to confront ethical issues when dealing with the internet and World Wide Web (WWW). In this term paper, I mostly focused to the importance of ethics among information technology professional. When we talk about the information technology professional, it will focus on computer professional field. Being the IT professional, it is must be good certificates in information technology with their knowledge and their skill. It is the powerful tool for providing job and the business opportunities and for meeting challenges in information technology field.First, the importance of ethics among information technology professional is responsible to ensure that computer technology does not used in the wrong ways which can harm people, environment and the society. That why information technology professional need to be fair, loyal, honest and have ethical in its practices because they want to be an employee where they work for an organization and make the organization become success. With the good ethics or behavior among IT professional, they will work comfortably without feel tired on their job and responsible in term of care of the data or information in the system.With the ethics of the employee directly they can contribute better for an organization. Besides that, the importance thing among the information technology professional is access the data. According to Gordana (2003), to perform the computer or information technology professional job, they will require to access the data only in order to complete their task that they want to do. Besides that, to complete their task, they are very careful in order to use the right time to complete their task beca use they will plan better first so that each of the task can be settle step by step.It is also because of the thinking of the information technology professional which is very high level thinking by using the technology that are provided in an organization or they own technology. Therefore, quality of the data that they want to access is the factor that they should consider so that the task must be done properly in a good manner. So, in order to do the task by information technology professional, they will not concern at all whether the task or the job is complete or not and without any concentration that are cause by improper ethics education. The other importance of ethics among information echnology professional is the procedure of information technology process that will keep in secret. According to Dahlbom and Mathiasan, information technology 5 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System professional just only participate in development the task, it objective and the context explicitly. For the information technology professional, it is very importance things for big organization in order to survive the industry because they have own strategy that need to do or any benchmark which it can be the key success of the business today for them.Allocated the resources is also the importance of ethics among the information technology professional. They must be professional and more responsible and punctual in complete the task that they need do and need to be done properly. It is because information technology professional like computer professional, just only take part in project with the time and the resources that are assigned which can make it possible to deliver a good job.Nevertheless, living in this era or modern information technology will happen something that are very wrong through the law which is computer crime and it is the one of the problems that need to be faced by information technology where it can attack an organization in term of vir uses and hackers that getting widespread over the years it is because Bynum (2001) stated that logical security can be divided into five aspects such as consistency by ensuring the data and behaviour can being see today and same with tomorrow, privacy and confidentially, controlling the access to the resources, not modified the data and the programs without proper authority in integrity and last but not list is in aspect unimpaired service. As we know that nowadays, there are many malicious kids of software that being used to access certain system without authorization. Viruses, Trojan horse, worms and logic bombs are some of the example that can harm the computer system in an organization. It is show that unethical action happened there which could make breaking the company system and could be penalized due to the unauthorized access.Because of that, information technology professional should be concerns on the ethics that should be apply in information technology themselves or the professional people who involved computer science so that, they could achieve a great environment information technology industries. At the same time, it can improved performance an individual in information technology field. Other than that, the importance of ethics among the information technology professional also will increase of respect among the professional people. When talk about the respect it is come from the cooperation between the team member which contribute to the development of the project that should be do by them and the 6 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System evelopers of the system understand the users needs because from that, information technology can find the opportunities in order to develop some of the project to fulfil the user requirements. Besides that, ethics in information technology professional can leads the user or customer satisfaction. As an example, computer professional will develop the systems that are related to the technology i n order to satisfy the interest of the users and directly can bring the good work environment by develop system. it will show that the performance of an organization if the information technology involve under the organization and make them become more professional in term of manage of information technology that are very importance in each of an organization in the world. 4. 0Ethics conceptual Theory Ethical theory provides framework to get at underlying rationale, classify and understand arguments and defend conclusion about right and wrong that have in ethical perspectives. Deontology People should follow to their obligations and duties when analyzing an ethical dilemma and it is very consistent decisions. Utilitarianism The ability to predict the sequences of action in order to determine which choice is Ethical Theory more beneficial. Right It is considered to be ethically correct and valid to the society. Virtue Judge a person by the character rather than by an action they may clash from the normal behavior. 7 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information SystemFigure 1: Ethics Theory All the ethical theory or concept above is define by the people who is expert in information technology profession or sociologist that are concern with the ethics and it is very importance that need to apply in information technology professional. 5. 0 Challenges in Encouraging Ethical Behaviors among Information technology professional. There are several common challenges in developing ethical in information technology professional. Information technology needs to alert with their surrounding because many challenges that they need to faced when they complete their task within the organization. Below are the challenges that are faced by information technology professional in managed their information technology equipment and services. 5. Facing with computer crimes As we know that, nowadays is the modern world. Therefore, all the technology that is used today mostly shows t he advanced technology. We know that media technology or the communication technology is very familiar to the people and the importance things is to the organization that are used the technology to implement and maintained the task in order to achieve the goals of an organization. But, when we deal with the advanced technology, the information technology professional need to be careful by used they ethical in term of complete the task. In this times, there are most of computer viruses and added with the hacker which also known as international spy.Here, the computer security is the crucial thing that needs to consider in the field of computer ethics by the information technology professional. By the way, the problem that is faced by them is not on the physical security but in term of logical security like privacy and confidentially, controlling access to the resources and so on. Hackers which are the person who breaks into someone computer system without any permission directly can steal the data of an organization or privacy information. 5. 2 Intellectual property rights connected with software ownership. In this aspect of challenges ethics or the right. Many people think that software should be own able.Intellectual property is the one of the controversial areas of computer ethics. Some people think that software ownership not be allowed 8 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System at all and all the information should be free, all programs should be available for copying. In term of that, it is very wrong ways according o the laws that are provided. As the information technology professional ethics, they need to know who take their intellectual property properly. 5. 3 Computer condition in the workplace that need to be concern As the information technology professional, the challenges that they faced is condition of the computer itself.Because of the computer always run to manage the data that are store in the system and to implement the data, ma ybe it will make the system down because the computer itself does not rest. When the system down happened that will make the information technology professional lack of ethics in order to monitor the system. 5. 4 Information privacy Privacy is the one of the computer ethics that need to be develop by public interest. The efficiency of the computer network can be used to gather the information, store, and search and retrieved the information making the computer technology treating anyone to keep various kind of information that are privacy.It is the challenges also that are faced by the information technology professional especially sensitive information like medical record. Because nowadays, the people think so far in order to get the information and make it as the basic information that is not importance. It is because of the hacker that wants the information. Therefore, information privacy nowadays also does not secure in hundred percent. 5. 5 Globalization In term of globalizatio n, computer ethics today is rapidly involved in more importance field. It is also can be known a global information ethics. Global networks like internet will connect people all over the world. Globalization refers to the variety of used like global cyber business, global education and so on.The world is very close to the technology which can provide electronic privacy and security on the interne in order to connect the international business transactions. This challenges is very familiar nowadays, because in 9 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System transaction of the business today cheating and fraud in business always happened. 6. 0 Recommendations to address the challenges in encouraging ethical behaviors among information technology professional In response to the challenges that are stated above, several recommendations are proposed as follow: 6. 1 Government should have a strict action with the computer crime. To address the challenges, I recommended that govern ment of each country in the world should be strict to the computer crime based on the computer crime act.There, people who involved in the investigation of the computer crime should find the people who do the wrong things in using computer until the people who make computer crime can be punished so that we can reduced the number of computer crime directly make it very clear. There, no give up action should behave but always find the ways on how to catch them. 6. 2 Discuss with the team member In this point, that I recommend, means that all the information technology professional that are deal with the information technology, should discuss everything about the problem or the challenges that they faced in manage the technology and the system. For example, when people used t software and sale that software without any permission of the software ownership, they could discuss about it on their intellectual property on how to take the action to the people who wrong in that situation.From the discussion with the team member, it will provide more decision and the best decision will be used to settle that problem. That is the good ethics when working in the group as the information technology professional. 6. 3 Told the society about the act of privacy We know that, government today implement the act of privacy but the society does not know about the act anymore. It is because the society today lack of information that they should know. When we told them about the act of 10 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System privacy, they will know what might be right and what might be wrong. From there, the act of privacy will be clear to the society. 6. 4Motivate the information technology professional In order to motivate the information technology professional, the top management in an organization should lead them in order to motivate them. Top management in an organization should remind the information technology professional when they do their job or work. It s very importance thing to do where the top manager alert with the leadership style or skill in each of the organization. Top manager should support their staff so that they will motivate to accomplish the task that is given. 6. 5 Organized seminar Some of the organization should organize the seminar o that all people involved in the seminar programmed.Especially, seminar about the information technology professional where the audience of the seminar will focus on the information technology department in term of tell about the ethics of information technology professional includes their roles and responsible. Told them on how to faced the problem or any challenges and on how to overcome it immediately. 11 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System 7. 0 Conclusion As the conclusion, by applying the ethics among the information technology, it will make the organization become more success and will make the individual become more talent when deal with something issues and a ny challenges that they need to face. By the ethics in themselves, will make them more professional in handling the information technology directly deals with the user or customer of the system.So, ethics is a set of principle that should have in all the people itself but not just only in information technology professional only. The importance of ethics among information technology professional should be concern by the people so that the environment of information technology become more special to the user and people who in charge on it. By applying the ethics also, we could determine that the right and wrong of an individual action. But, it is depending to the situation that is faced by the people. Therefore, with the ethics, information technology can avoid from the unethical action like unauthorized access, plagiarism, disturbing people privacy hacking the information and etc. ecause of that, information technology profession, need to concern the code of ethics so that the indiv idually performance could be improve and directly improve the company or organization itself in order to achieve the organization goals, vision, mission and objectives. 12 IMS657 Legal and Ethical Aspect of Information System 8. 0 References Bynum. (2001). Computer and information ethics. Retrieved April 10, 2013 from http://plato. stanford. edu/entries/ethics-computer/#ComCri Lacovino. (2002). Ethical principles and information professionals: Theory, practice and education. Retrieved April 10, 2013 from http://www. alia. org. au/publishing/aarl/33. 2/full. text/iacovino. html Worthington. (2008). Ethics for ICT professionals. Retrieved April 11, 2013 from http://www. tomw. net. au/technology/it/ictethics. shtml 13