Ethical Issues in Using online Data

Ethical Issues in Using Online Data

With the developments in technology, there have emerged new ways that people are using to communicate, including Facebook, Twitter, and WhatsApp, that is, the social media (Buchanan, 2012). These methods provide opportunities for research. Of late, the social media has become a platform that people use to share, source, and discuss current affairs as well as news (Zimmer, 2010). This is because they are cheap, fast, and easy to use. People can also send direct messages and communicate confidential information. As time goes, social media platforms are being increasingly used by large companies and multinational organizations to either facilitate communication among their staff or connect to their extensive customer bases (Buchanan, 2012). When used for communication between team members, it may be used to convey confidential information. This could be dangerous if there is a security breach. Thus, though these social media platforms are fast and cheap, their use presents significant ethical challenges (Chopra & Dexter, 2009). If these obstacles are not handled, then their consequences could be severe. In the recent past, companies have experienced significant improvements in their cyber security techniques. This has come with the development of software that have the ability to detect malicious activities and block them, making internet networking and transactions safer. However, it has not entirely eliminated data leakage and loss. Some scammers and cyber criminals can still access even encrypted information. Besides, some staff members can leak out information either accidentally or voluntarily. Voluntary leakage of information is unethical. This paper explores a case scenario of when an employee may leak out company’s data freely, to discuss the ethics of using data online. The following is a story in a data leakage ethics dilemma for a poor employee in a large social network company.

The scenario and its analysis

Alex was a database administrator in a large social network company Alpha. Over the past six years, he has worked as a subsidiary to the database administrator manager. He executes all orders and handles all issues that are supposed to be done by his senior. His senior’s role appears ceremonial. This makes him not satisfied with his job. During the period that Alex has worked in the company, he has had several requests for promotion turned down. Besides, he has asked for salary review many times, but not a single time has he had a pay increase. This has left him frustrated. To add salt to injury, most of his counterparts in the company, in spite of not having much skills and expertise as him, have been promoted over the years. This has given Alex something to worry about; his job. In fact, he has at times thought of quitting his job to look for greener pastures elsewhere. He wants to be appreciated. He desperately needs to feel appreciated and to match his earnings with his skills and experience.

Apart from problems at work, Alex has several problems at home. Due to his ‘small and stagnant’ salary, his wife has been pressurizing him to get a better job. According to his wife, his salary is too small for his skills. She questions Alex for not being aggressive enough to look for a better job. Though Alex needs a job, he knows that he desperately needs money more than a job. Even though he is not satisfied with his job and knows that his wife is complaining because of his ‘small’ salary. The thoughts of his frustrating job and his small funds are regularly consuming him every day. Beinga middle-aged man, he needs to save some dollars for his children’s education and the well-being of the family. As Alex continues looking for a new job, his situation worsens when his father and his wife are diagnosed with cancer. This presented a big problem to him. Her wife and his father were working. Now, they will not go to work, and besides paying their medical bills, Alex has to make sure that he employs someone to take care of them. Moreover, he has to provide for them and work more hours to meet all the medical and home expenses. However, the small amount that he has is not even enough to pay for their medical bills, let alone pay for their daily care. Like anybody could do, Alex takes his wife and dad to a hospital with the little that he has saved for her daughter’s education. They are then given bed rest. Since his place of work is not far from his home, he chooses not to employ a caretaker and copes with home and work at the same time. After one week, her daughter comes home with an invitation letter to a private college. She wants her dad to pay for her since he had promised that he had saved for her college education. Alex does not tell her that he used her college money to take her mother and grandfather to the hospital. Instead, he tells her to wait for a short time. In his lowest, a financial service company approaches Alex. The financial company offers Alex large sums of money that could solve all his problems in exchange for company Alpha’s data. They want to purchase the chat history of a senior board member of company Alpha. The finance company would then use the data to know more about company Alpha and consequently, make money out of it. Alex has to make a decision- a big one.

This situation presents Alex with a dilemma. He needs to make a big decision between the privacy code of his company and the living conditions of his family. His state as a husband, father, son, and also an employee makes it hard for him to make a decision that will not hurt some people’s interests. As a consequence, he can only dream of a win versus win in the current situation. He has to lose something to win something. On one side, he needs a lot of money. If he agrees to sell the chatting history of the board member, then he would solve all his problems at home. He wants to pay for the medication of his wife and that of his father. Moreover, he needs to take some time off from work to take care of them, or else pay somebody to do it for him. This requires money too. Since his father and his wife were working before getting sick, he needs to supplement his income for him to be able to adequately cater for his expenses at home. He also wants to pay for her daughter’s education and reduce the pressure by her wife of looking for a better job. Besides, he is not satisfied with his job. If he employs this rationale, then he may be ready to cash in the chat history of his board member.

On the other hand, he understands that selling the chat history of a board member is unethical (Zimmer, 2010). He knows that the action violates his company’s privacy code. Besides, selling the chat history of a board member could result in many unwanted activities. First, the data could be sold to competitors and be used to give them