Ethics for IT Professionals and IT Users

Objectives :
1. Identify the key characteristics that distinguish a
professional from other kinds of workers.
2.Understand various professional relationships and
associated key ethical issues.
3.Discuss how codes of ethics, professional organizations,
and certifications and licensing affect the ethical behavior
of IT professionals.
4.Identify the key principles of codes of ethics that provide
guidance for IT professionals.
5.Identify the common ethical issues that face IT users.
6.Discuss approaches for supporting the ethical practices of
IT users
 IT Professionals Information Technology
Profession is a calling requiring Professionals
specialized knowledge and often • Many workers in the IT
long intensive academic preparation. industry are partial list
Some code regulations defines a includes: considered to be
professional as someone who professionals. A partial list
meets one of these criteria :
includes:
• –Duties require advanced studies
in a recognized field. • Programmers/Analysts
• –Software engineers
• –One’s instruction, study, or work
is original and creative. • –Database administrators
• –Network administrators
• –Job requires consistent exercise • –Chief information officers
of discretion and

• –Job is predominately intellectual

and varied in character
• judgment.
 IT Professional-Professional
Professional Relationships Professionals feel a degree of loyalty to
IT professionals become involved in : other members in the profession.
Professionals help support each other
publicly. Professionals owe one another
Professional-employer an adherence to the profession’s code of
IT professionals must set the example conduct.
and enforce the policies that
promote ethical use of IT resources. Professional-IT user
An IT user is a person for whom the
Professional- client hardware or software is designed.
The professional and client each agree Professionals have a duty to understand the
to provide something of value to needs and capabilities of users.
each other. The IT professional Professionals have a responsibility to
usually provides a hardware or deliver their product or service on time
software product and the client and within budget.
provides compensation.
Professional-society
Professional-supplier
IT professionals develop and support
IT professionals may have many
different relationships with many systems that interact with the world
software, hardware, and service around them.
providers. The IT professional must The public expects that the members of the
be on guard to keep the
relationships honest and business IT profession will practice the profession
related in a way that will not bring harm to
society
The changing Professional
Services Industry GOVERNANCE
Seven forces that are changing Major scandals and tougher
the nature of professional laws enacted to avoid
services: future scandals have
created an environment in
CLIENT SOPHISTICATION
which there is less trust
Clients are more aware of what and more oversight in
they need from service client-service provider
providers, more willing to relationships.
look outside their own
CONNECTIVITY
organization to get the best
possible services , and better Clients and service providers
able to drive a hard bargain have built their working
to get the best possible relationships on the
services at the lowest expectation that they can
possible cost. communicate easily and
instantly around the globe
TRANSPARENCY GLOBALIZATION
Clients to be able to see work – in – Clients are able to evaluate
progress in real time, and they and choose among service
expect to be able to influence
that they be able to influence providers around the globe,
that work. No longer are clients making the service provider
willing to wait until the end industry extremely
product is complete before they competitive.
weigh in with comment and
feedback.
COMMODIZATION
MODULARIZATION Clients look at the delivery of
Clients are able to break down their low-end services as a
business processes into the commodity service for
fundamental steps and decide which price is the primarily
which they will perform
criterion for choosing a
themselves and which they will
outsource to service providers. service provider.
Whistle-blowing is an MISREPRESENTATION
effort by an employee Is the misstatement or
of a company to attract incomplete statement of a
material fact. If the
the attention of others
misrepresentation causes
to a negligent, illegal, the other party to enter into
unethical, abusive, or a contract, that party may
dangerous act by the have the legal right to
company that threatens cancel the contract or seek
the public interest. reimbursement for
damages.
FRAUD IS the crime of
obtaining goods , Trade secret is a piece of
services, or property information that is generally
through deception or not known to the public that
trickery. is held confidential
Breach of contract Bribery involves
– occurs when one party providing money,
fails to meet the terms property , or favors to
of a contract. someone in business or
material breach of government to obtain in
contact a business advantage.
- occurs when a party IT user distinguishes the
fails to perform certain person who uses a
express or implied hardware or software
obligations, which product from the IT
impairs or destroys the workers who develop,
essence of the install, service and
contract. support the product.
 Professional Codes of Ethics
Benefits of a Code of Ethics
A professional code of
ethics state the
1. Improves ethical
principles and core
decision-making.
values essential to the
work of a particular 2. Promotes high
occupational group. standards of practice
Practitioners in many and ethical behavior
professions subscribe 3. Enhances trust and
to a code of ethics that respect from the
governs their behavior. general public.
Code of conduct has two 4. Provides an
main parts: evaluation benchmark
1.Aspirations of the and ethical behavior.
organization
2.Rules and/or principles
PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATIONS Computer Society of the
Institute of Electrical and
Association for Computing Electronics Engineers
Machinery (ACM) (IEEE-CS)
It offers many publications helps meet the information
and electronics forums for and career development
technology workers , needs of computing
including Tech News . researchers and
Association of Information practitioners with
Technology Professionals
(AITP) technical journals,
provides IT- related seminars magazines, conferences,
and conferences, books, conference
information on IT issues, publications, and online
and forums for networking courses.
with other IT workers for
about 6,000 members,
Project Management Certification
Institute ( PMI )
indicates that a professional
its members include project possesses a particular
managers from such set of skills , knowledge
diverse fields as or abilities in the opinion
construction, sales, finance, of the certifying
and production, as well as organization.
information systems.
Licensing
SysAdmin,Audit,Network,
applies only to people and is
Security ( SANS ) Institute required by law,
provides information security certification can also
training and certification for apply to products and is
a wide range of individuals generally voluntary.
such as auditors, network
admin, and security
managers
Government Licensing  It is unclear who should
manage the content and
is a government –issued administration of licensing
permission to engage exams.
in an activity or to
operate a business.  There is no administrative
body to accredit
Reasons why there are few professional education
international or national programs.
licensing programs for IT
professionals:
 There is no universally accepted  There is no administrative
core body of knowledge. body to assess and ensure
competence of individual
The core body of knowledge for any workers.
profession outlines agreed-upon
sets of skills and abilities that all
licensed professionals must
possess.
Certification & Licensing • Legal Overview
Certification is a process Negligence is the omission to
administered by a do something which a
profession or reasonable person would
organization that one do, or something which a
undertakes voluntarily to prudent and reasonable
prove competency in a person would not do.
set of skills. Duty of care refers to the
Licensing is a process obligation that we not
generally administered cause any unreasonable
by the state that harm to others.
professionals must Professional malpractice is
undertake to prove that when a professional
they can practice their breaches duty of care
-commonly referred to as
profession in a way that
liability.
is ethical and safe to the
public.
The courts decide whether Common Ethical Issues for
parties owe a duty of care IT Users
by applying a  Software Piracy
reasonable person standard  Inappropriate Use of Computing
to evaluate how an Resources
objective, careful, and  Inappropriate Sharing of
conscientious person would Information
have acted in the same ___________________________
circumstances Supporting the Ethical Practices of IT
Users
 Establishing Guidelines for use of
Defendants who have Company Software
particular expertise or  Defining and limiting the
competence are measured Appropriate Use of IT resources
against a reasonable  Structuring Information systems to
professional standard protect data and information
 Installing and maintaining a
corporate firewall
FIREWALL – is a hardware  It is unclear who should
Or software device that serves manage the content
as a barrier between an
organization’s network and and administration of
the Internet licensing exams.
- limits access to the  There is no
company’s network based
on the organization’s administrative body to
Internet policy. accredit professional
education programs.
Reasons why there are few  There is no
international or national
licensing programs for IT
administrative body to
professionals: assess and ensure
competence of
 There is no universally individual workers.
accepted core body of
knowledge.
 Ten Commandments of  Thou shalt not appropriate
Computer Ethics other people's intellectual
 Thou shalt not use a computer to output.
harm other people. 
 Thou shalt not interfere with other  Thou shalt think about the
people's computer work. social consequences of the
 Thou shalt not snoop around in program you write.
other people's files.  Thou shalt use a computer in
 Thou shalt not use a computer to ways that show consideration
steal. and respect.
 Thou shalt not use a computer to
bear false witness. The Ten Commandments of
 Thou shalt not use or copy Computer Ethics are the means
software for which you have not to build a set of regulations to
paid. . guide the individual users to
 Thou shalt not use other people's base computer related
computer resources without operations on strong ethical
authorization. values. The commandments are
a way to make people
understand the ethics involved in
the use of technology