Ethics and Professional Practices

Running head: ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES
Ethics and Professional Practices
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ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES
Table of Contents
Question 1..................................................................................................................................2
Question 2..................................................................................................................................5
Question 3..................................................................................................................................8
References................................................................................................................................11

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ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES
Question 1
Ethical Issue surrounding the 2018 Facebook Cambridge Analytica Data Scandal after
Analysis with Philosophical Ethical Perspectives
The Facebook Cambridge Analytica data scandal is considered as one of the most
popular scandal that occurred in 2018 (Zunger, 2018). It was revealed that Cambridge
Analytica, a leading political consulting firm in England had harvested the respective
personal data of the millions of Facebook users without any consent and they were utilized
for political purpose (Common, 2018). This particular scandal was extremely significant to
incit public discussion on the ethical standards for politicians, political consulting companies
and social media organizations.
The entire political scandal of data breaching was extremely unethical and illegal as
Cambridge Analytica in respect to any type of ethical perspective. There are four distinct
ethical perspectives that are required to be considered while analysing the case study of
Facebook Cambridge Analytica scandal and these perspectives are as follows:
i) Utilitarianism Theory: The first and the foremost theory is the utilitarianism theory.
It is a prominent and significant perspective of ethics that is well aligned with free market
outlook, which dominates the current thinking regarding management, business and
economics (Noddings, 2013). Utilitarianism majorly focuses on the results and not on the
rules. A set of actions is majorly deemed as right or good when it eventually maximizes the
pleasure or happiness throughout the society. This specific ethical perspective selects the
action that maximized utility and it defined as the situation that produces the greatest
wellbeing of the maximum number of people involved in the case scenario. It is the basic
form of consequentialism that refers to the major consequences of any particular action are
the only standards of correct and incorrect (Critchley, 2014). For the case study of Facebook

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ETHICS AND PROFESSIONAL PRACTICES
Cambridge Analytica 2018, it is being analysed that there is no utility present and that the
data of the users were being breached for political motive. Moreover, these users were not
even informed neither consents were taken from them and hence it was completely used for
personal profit of that particular political analytics firm. Since, the case study did not provide
any utility to the situation, thus it is unethical.
ii) Deontology Theory: The second theory is deontology. In contrast to the
utilitarianism perspective, deontological view provides a moral intent after following the
correct rules and is a better path for understanding the ethical conduct and not only for
achieving the correct results (Fromm, 2013). As per this theory, an ethical action arises from
doing the duty of that specific individual and these duties are eventually defined by rational
thought. In this particular case study, Cambridge Analytica did not follow the deontological
duties and thus it is unethical.
iii) Social Justice Theory and Social Contract Theory: The third ethical perspective
is social justice theory and social contract theory. As per this theory, any action should
provide justice and a social contract should be maintained. This social contract ensures that
people are giving up certain rights to the government after exchanging security and common
benefits (Gatens, 2013). However, in this case study, there was a massive fall in the stock
price of Facebook and it called for tighter regulation of organizational data usage. Hence, the
social contract was not maintained and this case study is unethical.
iv) Virtue Theory: The fourth ethical perspective, virtue ethics ensures that perceived
goals are required for bringing success and maintaining ethics in any situation. The virtue or
the moral character of the person is responsible for carrying out any specific action and not
only the ethical duties and rules. For this case study of Facebook data scandal, the consumer
advocate eventually were called for better user security within the online media as well as the