ICT Professional Practice and Ethics: Cambridge Analytica Case Study

This report provides a detailed analysis of the Cambridge Analytica data scandal and its implications on ICT professional practice and ethics. It discusses the use of information and communication technology in manipulating US elections and examines the ethical issues involved. The report also analyzes the case using the ACS Code of Ethics.

Running head: ICT PROFESSIONAL PRACTICE AND ETHICS
ICT Professional Practice and Ethics: Cambridge Analytica Case Study
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author’s Note:

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Executive Summary
This report aims to provide detailed analysis of the case scenario of data scandal of
Cambridge Analytica. This data scandal was executed by means of ICT. It eventually
includes wireless network, proper communication medium as well as the Internet connection.
All of such distinctive technologies comprise of the core capability of enormous collection of
communication capacities. This particular technology is required to handle
telecommunications, broadcast media, to process transmission as well as audio visual system,
management systems towards intelligent buddy, management of functions and network based
monitor. Proper discussion on DET and ACS code of ethics is provided for the case scenario.

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Table of Contents
1. Introduction............................................................................................................................3
2. Brief Background of Case Study Given.................................................................................3
3. Analyses of Situation with Doing Ethics Technique.............................................................5
3.1 What is going on?.............................................................................................................5
3.2 What are the facts?...........................................................................................................5
3.3 What are the issues?.........................................................................................................6
3.4 Who is affected from the case study?..............................................................................7
3.5 What are the ethical issues and their implications?.........................................................7
3.6 What could be done about identified ethical issues?.......................................................8
3.7 What are the major options from the case study?............................................................8
3.8 Which option is the best amongst the identified options and why?.................................8
4. Detailed Analyses of the provided Situation with ACS Code of Ethics................................9
5. Conclusion and Appropriate Recommendation for the Provided Case Study.....................11
References................................................................................................................................12

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1. Introduction
ICT is responsible for providing significant access to confidential information or data
after consideration of telecommunication network (Dutta, Geiger and Lanvin 2015). This
particular technology is extremely similar to IT, however information and communication
technology mainly focuses on the process of communication. Each and every organizational
member can easily and promptly communicate and share ideas by taking help from several
technologies such as instant messaging, faxes, VoIP, audio conferences and video
conferences (Marchewka 2014). Few important and noteworthy social networking websites
such as Google+, Twitter and Facebook subsequently allow the respective users from
separate sections of world to communicate properly.
In spite of all such significant and important merits of information and
communication technology, there are some of the noteworthy demerits for the specified
technology. Confidential data of an organization can be easily hacked, hence cyber threats are
possible for the technology (Holtshouse 2013). The report demonstrates about a case
scenario, where a typical organization of Cambridge Analytica was subsequently accused for
data extraction of few users from their respective profiles in Facebook for the core purpose of
manipulating US elections in 2016. A whistle blower had blown the whistle for such illegal
activity. DET and ACS will be used for ethical analyses.
2. Brief Background of Case Study Given
A popular and noteworthy data science as well as technology organization,
Cambridge Analytica is responsible to serve its clients regarding data accuracy and
effectiveness (Cambridge Analytica Scandal. 2019). During the US elections of 2016, they
provided data about president campaign for Donald Trump, hence allowing several targeted
political posts in Facebook. This entire action was eventually conducted by them in Facebook

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for having the distinctive purpose of influencing or manipulating voting ideologies or
intentions of the citizens of the USA (Cambridge Analytica Whistleblower. 2019).
Cambridge Analytica collected the personal details of these users, including contact
information, phone number and names, with a hope that they would have the core ability of
using these data within the campaign of Donald Trump. Moreover, for the subsequent
accomplishment of this specific action, Cambridge Analytica conducted a quiz in Facebook
(Cambridge Analytica Scandal. 2019). For logging in within Facebook social networking
website, it is needed to provide valid username and password, hence whenever a user logged
into Facebook, Cambridge Analytica extracted personal data of that particular person. By
analysing the case study, conclusion was drawn that the confidential data was extracted for
more than 870000 users in the USA. They had taken the help of information and
communication technology for executing this particular unethical activity (Cambridge
Analytica Whistleblower. 2019). The transmission lines of ICT were responsible for carrying
out such diverse types and formats of users’ data.
Christopher Wylie is an ex-employee of Cambridge Analytica, who became famous
after blowing whistle for the respective organization (Cambridge Analytica Whistleblower.
2019). He had worked with the management of Cambridge Analytica and hence he had clear
idea about the unethical or illegal activities that are being done within this organization. The
main reason or purpose of Cambridge Analytica to extract the users’ personal data from
Facebook is that they used that data to develop psychographic profiles, with the major
purpose of delivering any kind of pro-Trump materials for the citizens or users, who gave the
quiz (Cambridge Analytica Scandal. 2019).
Apart from the people giving the quiz, the management of Cambridge Analytica even
extracted the data of those users, who were the in the friend list of people, giving quiz. This
eventually created a huge breakdown of ethical and unethical means. Moreover, Facebook

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was also accused of providing platform to such illegal and unethical data extraction. Mark
Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, denied this accusation and mentioned that they have been
protecting users’ data with utmost priority (Cambridge Analytica Whistleblower. 2019).
Christopher Wylie gave these details to the most popular newspapers in the USA and hence
when such accusations came out, Alexander Nix, Chief Executive Officer of Cambridge
Analytica was suspended from his position and on the other hand, Mark Zuckerberg faced
legal enquiries.
3. Analyses of Situation with Doing Ethics Technique
Doing Ethics Technique is responsible to provide milestones and ideologies in any
particular ethical case study. A relevant description of the case scenario for Cambridge
Analytica is being provided in respect to DET in the following paragraphs:
3.1 What is going on?
A popular and noteworthy data science as well as technology organization,
Cambridge Analytica was eventually accused for data extraction unethically from the quiz in
Facebook with the major purpose of knowing about the voting intentions and ideas of the
users during the 2016 USA elections (Bloom et al. 2014). As soon as the several citizens in
the US substantially tried for logging in after providing distinctive password and username,
the organization of Cambridge Analytica had extracted these data for both personal and
political reasons. Moreover, the personal data of users’ friends were also collected by this
organization. The second important factor that was being highlighted was data accessibility
of more than 870000 users in the USA for Facebook (Stein et al. 2015). An ex-employee of
Cambridge Analytica, Christopher Wylie blew a whistle against such unethical and illegal
activities of the organization that subsequently led to suspension of CEO of Cambridge
Analytica.

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3.2 What are the facts?
The main facts in the case study are as follows:
i) Cambridge Analytica had unethically as well as illegally collected the personal data
for over eight lakh users within the USA to know regarding president’s campaign of Donald
Trump (Okumus 2013).
ii) The respective act of data extraction is solely responsible to allow every type of
targeted political post within Facebook so that they are able to influence the significant voting
intentions of US based citizens.
iii) Another important and significant fact in this case scenario is organizational
management had arranged for a quiz to extract the confidential data (Bai and Sarkis 2013).
iv) An ex-employee of this particular organization, Christopher Wylie blew a whistle
for drawing the personal or confidential information of users by not undertaking consent from
these users to manipulate the voting intentions in 2016 US elections.
v) When accusations were proved, Mark Zuckerberg denied this accusation and they
mentioned about data security of users (Melián-González and Bulchand-Gidumal 2016).
vi) As a result, CEO of the respective organization got suspended and that of
Facebook social networking website had faced enquiries.
3.3 What are the issues?
The main issues in this case scenario are provided below:
i) The major issue identified in the case study of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica
is that they collected and extracted personal or sensitive data to manipulate vote predictions
in 2016 US based elections (Marinagi, Trivellas and Sakas 2014).

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ii) The next significant and vital issue that was identified in the case study of data
scandal of Cambridge Analytica is that Facebook conducted a quiz for voting to obtain
manipulative results.
iii) A major allegation was given on Facebook for helping out this organization of
Cambridge to provide platform for execution of data extraction plan and even enabling these
unethical people in using the platform to extract confidential data of the users (Abdekhoda et
al. 2014).
iv) The purpose was to obtain manipulative voting and providing benefits to political
campaigns for Donald Trump.
3.4 Who is affected from the case study?
The citizens of the United States of America, who did not have any idea regarding the
unethical act were the most significant affected individuals within case scenario of data
scandal of Cambridge Analytica (Galluch, Grover and Thatcher 2015). The most significant
reason would be that all of such citizens did not gain scope towards voting rights and justice.
Hence, political rights were not provided to the citizens. The next affected individuals in this
case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica were customers and stakeholders who
may lose their respective jobs for the unethical activities for senior executives and authorities
(Strohmeier 2013).
3.5 What are the ethical issues and their implications?
The main ethical issues and their implications are provided below:
i) A major ethical issue for the case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica
would be personal data of over 870000 users of Facebook were gathered by the organization
to help out the political candidate of their choice (Luftman, Lyytinen and Zvi 2017).

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ii) The second ethical issue for this case scenario would be that Facebook included
unethical and illegal activity. As Facebook is the social networking website and all citizens
utilize the website to connect with friends, it was extremely unethical for getting involved in
this type of activity (Tayeh, Al-Jarrah and Tarhini 2015).
iii) Elections were being arranged to fairly choose any political leader, although in
this case study, they extracted data of the users for the core purpose of manipulating voting
rights.
3.6 What could be done about identified ethical issues?
For resolving these recognized and important ethical issues, subsequent legal steps are
needed to be taken (Wang, Hu and Hu 2013). The whistleblower Christopher Wylie had
blown up the whistle, however severe steps were not taken against these unethical people and
these legal actions must be stricter so that such activity is not repeated under any
circumstance.
3.7 What are the major options from the case study?
The main options recognized in the case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge
Analytica are provided below:
i) Complete shutdown of Cambridge Analytica and Facebook is the first and the most
important alternative in this case scenario (Shih et al. 2013).
ii) The second option is to showcase the case study to all other parts of the world by
involving media and social media.
iii) The third alternative or option is that both the CEOs of Facebook and Cambridge
Analytica must be extremely penalized to involve illegal activity for extraction of data
(Thomas 2015).

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3.8 Which option is the best amongst the identified options and why?
The best option for the case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica would
be the third option. Two CEOs of the two organizations must be penalized to get involved in
any type of illegal and unethical activity for extraction of data from the Facebook users
(Tayeh, Al-Jarrah and Tarhini 2015).
4. Detailed Analyses of the provided Situation with ACS Code of Ethics
Australian Computer Society codes of ethics could be eventually utilized for better
analysis of the case scenario for the data scandal of Cambridge Analytica (ACS Code of
Ethics. 2019). A proper description for all of these ethical codes is provided in the following
paragraphs:
a) The Primacy of the Public Interest: This particular ACS code of ethics states that
any specific organizational member or organization must not eventually place the respective
business as well as personal interests over public interests (ACS Code of Ethics. 2019). They
should always consider the choices of customers on top priority for ensuring that all types of
issues or complexities are being eradicated on time. It is quite vital to be ethical in nature as
the respective organizational management could eventually provide all types of benefits to
their stakeholders, especially to customers (Bai, C. and Sarkis 2013). For the case scenario of
data scandal of Cambridge Analytica, this particular organization with the involvement of
Facebook majorly considered about the various personal options regarding president’s
campaign and hence was termed as unethical in nature.
b) The Enhancement of Quality of Life: This particular ACS code of ethics states
that any specific organizational member or organization is subsequently responsible to
increase the overall and total quality of every working condition with the significant purpose
of incrementing productivity to a higher level (ACS Code of Ethics. 2019). The major reason

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behind such unethical view point is that they are absolutely related to any kind of work
category and as soon as quality of work is being improved, the entire system of organization
or even output could be termed as ethical in nature (Wang, Hu and Hu 2013). For the case
scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica, quality of work within the business was
being degraded, hence confidential data of the users losing integrity.
c) Honesty: This particular ACS code of ethics states that the ethical view point of
honesty must be properly maintained to represent the several services, products and skills and
hence ensuring honesty and high quality of work (ACS Code of Ethics. 2019). For the case
scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica, all the senior officers such as Chief
Executive Officer namely, Alexander Nix was declared as dishonest, Facebook had
completely repudiated this significant accusation.
d) Competence: This particular ACS code of ethics states that the competence as well
as diligence was needed to maintain at any cost for all stakeholders or any other person
associated with this company (ACS Code of Ethics. 2019). It also makes sure that ethical
view point is being maintained, however in the case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge
Analytica, the senior authorities had lacked both diligence and competence, hence was
referred to as non ethical (Luftman, Lyytinen and Zvi 2017).
e) Professional Development: This particular ACS code of ethics states that any
specific organizational member or organization must eventually develop competence towards
professionalism, with the core purpose of maintenance of work ethics in the organization
(ACS Code of Ethics. 2019). For the case scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica,
all the senior authorities like Chief Executive Officer became non ethical by proper extraction
of data from social networking website of Facebook (Galluch, Groverand Thatcher 2015).

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f) Professionalism: This particular ACS code of ethics states that any specific
organizational member or organization must comprise of professionalism for their work to
enhance productivity and quality of data to a higher level (ACS Code of Ethics. 2019).
Subsequent efficiency and effectiveness are being obtained from this factor. For the case
scenario of data scandal of Cambridge Analytica, the senior authorities lacked
professionalism, thus they were claimed as unethical by the ex-employee Christopher Wylie
(Marinagi, Trivellas and Sakas 2014).
5. Conclusion and Appropriate Recommendation for the Provided Case Study
Therefore, a proper conclusion can be drawn that information and communication
technology could be stated as an important technology, which eventually provides efficient
communication to the users. Internet service provider or ISP can provide specific television
service, internet and phone service with the help of the optical cables. Modernized
communication technology can be termed as quite efficient for resolving any kind of
complexity or issue associated to all types of communication errors at any circumstance.
Although, ICT has been providing several subsequent merits, however few case studies are
present, in which ICT has proved to be extremely devastating. Data scandal of Cambridge
Analytica is one of such case studies that occurred during 2016 elections within the United
States of America. A proper analysis of this case scenario is provided in the above report with
suggestion.
An appropriate suggestion for case study of Cambridge Analytica after inclusion of
Doing Ethics Technique and Australian Computer Society ethical codes is that strict actions
and regulations against the CEOs of Cambridge Analytica and Facebook, Alexander Nix and
Mark Zuckerberg. The most significant reason to give this particular suggestion would be that
both of these chief executive officers were extremely unethical as they undertook unethical
actions for their own motives and hence they opted for illegal methods.

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