TH1610

Ethics and Intellectual Property

Ethics are the principles and standards that guide our behavior toward other people. How one decide ethical
issues must depend especially on his basic ethical structure but also for better or worse on the practical
circumstances. One’s basic ethics are probably acquired while growing up.
Unethical Computer Usages
o People copy, use, and distribute software they have no right to.
o Employees search organizational databases for information on celebrities and friends.
o Organizations collect, buy, and use information and don’t check the validity of accuracy of that
information.
o Misguided people create and spread viruses that cause trouble for those using and maintaining IT
systems.
o Information system developers put systems on the market before they’re completely tested.
o Unethical people break into computer systems and steal passwords, information, and proprietary
information.
o Employees destroy or steal proprietary schematics, sketches, customer lists, and reports of their
employers.
o People snoop on each other and read each other’s e-mail and other private files.
Intellectual property is intangible creative work that is embodied in physical form. Music, novels, paintings,
and sculptures are all examples of intellectual property. Such properties are covered by copyright law. This
law protects the authorship of literary and dramatic works, musical and theatrical compositions, and works of
art.
Copyright is the legal protection of afforded an expression of idea, such as a song, video game, and some types
of proprietary documents. As a form of intellectual property, software is usually protected by copyright law,
although sometimes it falls under patent law, which protects an idea. However, copyright law doesn’t forbid
use of intellectual property completely. It has some notable exceptions such as the Fair Use Doctrine.
Fair Use Doctrine says that one may use copyrighted material in certain situations, for example, in the creation
of new work or, within certain limits, for teaching purposes.
Pirated software is the unauthorized use, duplication, distribution, or sale of copyrighted software. In some
parts of the world, 90% of business software is pirated. The Software Information Industry Association (SIIA)
and the Business Software Alliance (BSA) say that pirated software means lost jobs, wages, and tax revenues,
and is a potential barrier to success for software start-ups around the globe (Haag, 2010).
Privacy
Privacy is the right to be left alone when one wants to be, to have control over one’s personal possessions,
and not to be observed without one’s consent. Privacy can be compromised by other individuals snooping on
you, employers monitoring your actions, by businesses that collect information on your needs, preferences,
and surfing practices, and by the various government agencies that collect information on citizens (Haag,
2010).
Key logger or key trapper is a program that, when installed on a computer, records every keystroke and mouse
click. It records all e-mail, instant messages, chat room exchanges, websites a person visits, applications one
runs, and even passwords typed in on that computer.
Identity theft is the forging of someone’s identity for the purpose of fraud. The fraud is often for financial gain,
and the stolen identity is used to apply for and use credit cards in the victim’s name or to apply for a loan.

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Ways to Steal Identities Online

• Phishing (also called carding or brand spoofing) is a technique to gain personal information for the
purpose of identity theft, usually by means of fraudulent e-mail.
• Pharming refers to the rerouting of a person’s request for a legitimate website.
Hardware key logger is a hardware device that captures keystrokes on their journey from the keyboard to the
motherboard. These devices can be in the form of connector on the system-unit end of the cable between the
keyboard and the system unit.
Privacy and Consumers
Businesses face the following dilemmas:
• Customers want businesses to know who they are, but, at the same time, they want them to leave
them alone.
• Customers want businesses to provide what they want, but, at the same time, they don’t want
businesses knowing too much about their habits and preferences.
• Customers want businesses to tell them about products and services they might like to have, but they
don’t want to be drowned with ads.
Security
Information security is a broad term encompassing the protection of information from accidental or
intentional misuse by persons inside or outside an organization. It is the primary tool an organization can use
to combat the threat associated with downtime. Downtime refers to a period of time when a system is
unavailable due to network failures, power outages, natural disasters, MIS outrages, and other unplanned
circumstances. Downtime can cause damage to organization’s reputation, lost revenues, unstable financial
performance, and worst – customer loss.
What can put an important information resource in jeopardy? Countless things such as hard disks can crash,
computer parts can fail, hackers and crackers can gain access and do mischief, thieves engaged in industrial
espionage can steal information, and discontented employees or associates can also cause damage.
Threats to Information Security
• Hackers are general knowledgeable computer users who use their knowledge to invade other people’s
computers, and usually have varying motives.
• Cybercrimes ranged from electronically breaking and entering to cyber stalking and murder. Computer
viruses and denial-of-service attacks are the two (2) most common types of cybercrime against which
companies need to protect themselves.
• Computer virus is a software that is written with malicious intent to cause annoyance and damage. A virus
can be benign or malicious. Benign virus just displays a message on the screen or slows the computer
down, but doesn’t do much damage. Malicious virus targets a specific application or set of file types and
corrupts or destroys them.
• Worm is the most prevalent type of virus today. It spreads itself, not just from file to file, but from
computer to computer via e-mail and other Internet traffic. It finds your e-mail address book and helps
itself to the addresses and sends itself to your contacts, using your e-mail address as the return address.
• Denial-of-service attack (DoS) floods a server or network with so many requests for service that it slows
down or crashes. The objective is to prevent legitimate customers from accessing the target site.

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Security Precautions
Anti-virus software detects and removes or quarantines computer viruses. It is regarded to be the most basic
protection software running on a computer. It will block cookies, pop-up ads, and embedded objects.
Firewall is hardware and/or software that protects a computer or network from intruders. The firewall
examines each message as it seeks entrance to the network, like a border guard checking passports.
Encryptions scramble the contents of a file so that people can’t read it without having the right decryption
key. Public key encryption is an encryption system that uses two (2) keys: a public key that everyone can have
and a private key for only the recipient.

References
Baltzan, P. (2013). Business driven technology (5th ed.). New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Haag, S. C. (2010). Management information systems for the information age (8th ed.). New York: McGraw-
Hill/Irwin.

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