ICT Professional Practice and Ethics: Cambridge Analytica Case Study

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ICT Professional Practice and Ethics
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Executive summary
The report throws light on the scandal of Cambridge Analytica in association with
Facebook. This report will identify the scandal or unethical act of Cambridge
Analytica done during the presidential campaign of President Trump. This report will
follow the implementation of Doing Ethics Technique for analysing the current
situation or issue of Cambridge Analytica. It will also throw light on the situational
analysis of this unethical act from the perspective of an ICT professional with the use
of the Australian Computer Society Code of Ethics. This analysis would ensure the
unethical and unprofessional behaviour of CA towards the community, investors,
employees, the general public and the government.
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Table of Contents
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................4
Background to the case study...............................................................................................................5
Analysis of the situation using the “Doing Ethics Technique”................................................................7
What’s going on?...............................................................................................................................7
What are the facts?...........................................................................................................................7
What are the issues?.........................................................................................................................8
Who is affected?................................................................................................................................8
What are the ethical issues and implications?...................................................................................8
What can be done about it?..............................................................................................................9
What are the options?.......................................................................................................................9
Which option is best and why?..........................................................................................................9
Analysis of the situation from the point of view of an ICT Professional using the ACS Code of Ethics.
.............................................................................................................................................................11
The Primacy of the Public Interest...................................................................................................11
The Enhancement of Life Quality.....................................................................................................11
Honesty...........................................................................................................................................12
Competence....................................................................................................................................12
Professional Development...............................................................................................................12
Professionalism................................................................................................................................12
Conclusion...........................................................................................................................................14
References...........................................................................................................................................15
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Introduction
Professional ethics have become utmost significant for the Information and
Communications Technology (ICT) in an organisation. Breach of these ethical
practices leads to severe penalties or even closure of the organisation. Cambridge
Analytica was a London-based organisation engaged in political consulting with the
help of data analysis, data mining, and data brokerage during the times of electoral
processes. It was initiated in 2013 but got defunct after the scandal with Facebook
during the presidential campaign of Donald Trump. The company was caught red-
handed under the undercover operation where it identified that the giant company
Facebook was also involved equally in this scandal.
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Background to the case study
In the case of Cambridge Analytica, it had revealed that it had misused the personal
data of more than 8,700,000 Facebook users in the USA during Trump's presidential
campaign. Their main aim behind such a drastic move was to influence the voting
intentions of people towards the favour of Donald Trump. A quiz conducted that
required Facebook login and through this quiz; CA successfully harvested the
personal information of a considerable number of people. And it reported that more
than 270,000 people participated actively in this quiz which means that CA got the
personal information about these people (Youtube.com, 2018). Not only had this, but
these people permitted for accessing their own as well as their friend's personal
information to CA.
It considered as a giant case of data breaches. This highly confidential information
successfully derived using an undercover operation involving the senior executives
of CA. Under this operation, CEO Alexander Nix caught after his suggestion of using
bribes, misinformation, and sex workers for assisting the political candidates gain
many votes from all over the world. Initially, the whole scandal of CA came into light
after the allegations placed by the ex-employee of CA named Christopher Wylie
(Meredith, 2018). All the alleged practices initiated with the app “thisisyourdigitallife”
developed by Aleksandr Kogan in 2014 in which the payment rewards provided to
the users for participating in the psychological test. In this way, data mining
undertook of more than 50 million Facebook profiles that constituted a quarter of the
USA's entire Facebook user-base.
In 2010, Facebook introduced “Open Graph” in which the external developers reach
to Facebook users. In 2013, the app named “thisisyourdigitallife” that involves the
payment rewards to users on participating in a quiz or survey. New rules adopted by
Facebook in 2014 for restricting the developer’s access to user data to ensure that
the data of users’ friends could not access without their permission. The organisation
assisted Ted Cruz in his presidential campaign in the year 2015 (Psaila, 2018). In
2016, Cambridge Analytica joined the presidential campaigns of President Donald
Trump for influencing the voting intentions of people by using political
advertisements and posts. In the same year, the information related to billions of
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users derived unethically and illegally where these users were mainly Facebook
users through the app “thisisyourdigitallife”. However, the exposure of this huge
scandal undertaken after two years in 2018 when undercover sting operation with
senior executives of CA took place (Meredith, 2018). After this, the Federal Trade
Commission ordered an investigation and analysis for ensuring the violation by
Facebook of the user privacy protections with US Government Agency.
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Analysis of the situation using the “Doing Ethics Technique”.
Doing Ethics Technique
Doing Ethics Technique refers to an essential tool for the identification of ethical as
well as non-ethical issues in a particular scenario. It helps in depicting ethical
thinking and does not guarantee of providing the best solution to the given situation.
Doing Ethics Technique is suitable to be applied in the scenario of Cambridge
Analytica-Facebook scandal.
What’s going on?
Senior executives including CEO harvested and used the personal information of
millions of Facebook users using an unethical manner. This case considers as one
of the most significant data breaches of giant tech organisations. The organisation
conducted a quiz and the personal information of participants harvested including the
personal data of their friends. In this way, CA access to millions of Facebook user
profiles for influencing their voting intentions during the saga of the presidential
campaign of Donald Trump (Cadwalladr, 2018). The key players of this scandal
Aleksandr Kogan, the founder of Global Science Research; Robert Mercer, who
funded Cambridge Analytica; Steve Bannon, Former Vice President of Cambridge
Analytica LLC; and Alexander Nix, CEO of Cambridge Analytica UK and SCL
Elections.
What are the facts?
 The most significant fact in this scenario implies the undercover operation
footage where the senior executives provided unethical suggestions for
winning votes.
 Interview and testimony with the ex-employee Christopher Wylie of
Cambridge Analytica primarily initiated the exposure of this scandal.
 The app named “thisisyourdigitallife" developed solely for harvesting personal
data of Facebook users.
 Also, the direct messages sent to Facebook users for winning votes in favour
of President Trump can use as strong evidence (Psaila, 2018).
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What are the issues?
The critical issue in this scenario identified as a derivation of the personal information
of Facebook users using an unlawful and unethical manner. It is the most significant
ethical issue in this scenario. The participants of the quiz and their friends lose their
data that can use for any illegal or unethical purpose. It is the deception with the
whole country as a fraud with a large number of people who constitute a significant
part of a country implies the scam with the entire country. Contract with Steve
Mannon and Robert Mercer also established unethically and by providing fake
scenarios (France-Presse, 2019). Also, it seems that the employees who were
aware of the scandal were not happy with what was going on in the company. It
shows that the employees had to involve unwillingly in this unethical act.
Who is affected?
This scenario affected a large number of people involved in this scandal whether the
victims or culprits. The people whose Facebook profiles got accessed by CA were
millions in quantity, and they lose their personal data, and their voting intentions also
influenced. Next, the organisation itself affected to the extent that it had to defunct
after getting proved of the scandal. Apart from this, the senior executives may have
to lose their employment and became liable for strict punishments. It affected mostly
the whole community and the investors of the organisation (Chang, 2018). This
scenario mainly changed the US voters whose personal information got stolen. Their
opinions also manipulated during the presidential campaigns of Trump. Not only had
this but the investors and other members involved in this scandal without being
aware of this scandal.
What are the ethical issues and implications?
The ethical issue in this scenario implied the adoption of unethical and unauthorised
manner for attaining and misusing the personal information of billions of people
without their knowledge. It indirectly impacted the views and opinions of a significant
population of the country regarding such crucial political issue. Data breaching is a
cyber crime which is the ethical issue in this scenario. Mark Zuckerberg made a
public apology for involving in this scandal. The giant social media Facebook implied
for making the government ensured the protection of the users ((Meredith, 2018).
The government of the UK suggested here in this scenario to investigate the
involvement of the people and the misuse of data.
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What can be done about it?
For resolving the case, there are several solutions available. Dysfunction of the
company and high penalties would be the significant alternatives for case resolution.
Apart from this, the people involved knowingly should also be liable for strict
punishment and penalties. More education should give to the general public as what
are the appropriate or safe places for revealing the personal data. It implies that the
users of Facebook or other social media sites must have the knowledge and
intelligence about where should personal details be provided. Social media platforms
use for influencing a large number of people for positive or good intentions
(Youtube.com, 2018). Therefore, a committee should develop for monitoring the
activities of these social media sites. The crucial role in resolving this case plays by
the government that can develop and implement strict rules and regulations for
eliminating the concept of data breaching.
What are the options?
This scenario involves mainly the case of data breaching and fraud from a large
number of voters for influencing their voting intentions. It is such a massive scandal
that there are only a few options available for resolving this case. New rules and
regulations can develop with more strict provisions and punishments about data
protection and cybercrime. Suspension of the culprits is necessary for making other
organisations aware and preventing them from undertaking any such unethical act.
Moreover, education and training to people are vital for preventing and reducing the
number of cybercrimes. The data security policy requires strict adherence by the
social media platforms or other sites from where personal data can be revealed
(Cadwalladr, 2018). Auditing of such companies would assist in identifying the areas
of improvement or unethical activities. Audits and assessments regularly whether
monthly or weekly would assist in establishing control over such cybercrimes.
Which option is best and why?
The best option for dealing with the scenario of Cambridge Analytica states to be the
establishment of a new cybercrime policy from the government. Under this policy,
the organisations should require regular audits and assessments from the
governmental agencies. Identification of cybercrime would be liable for the
punishment or high penalties. Serious cybercrimes would involve the suspension of
the company as well as the involved members (France-Presse, 2019). Strict rules
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and regulations would need to be adhered by the organisations, and the central role
of government in this solution is to monitor the activities of these organisations. The
organisations would keep in surveillance, and this would prevent them from
engaging in cybercrime activities or unethical practices.
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Analysis of the situation from the point of view of an ICT Professional using
the ACS Code of Ethics.
The ACS Code of Ethics constitutes a significant part of the Constitution of
Australian Computer Society. This code of ethics implies that for being an ACS
member, one must maintain and advance the dignity, effectiveness, and honour of
the ICT profession. This code of ethics encompasses specific ACS values for the
conformance within the law and being a good citizen. Analysis of Cambridge
Analytica-Facebook case from the perspective of an ICT professional using the ACS
values is as follows:
The Primacy of the Public Interest
This is the most significant value that states placing the public interests above the
business, sectional or personal interests. It shows that an ICT Professional requires
acting in the best interest of the public without more consideration to their interests.
In this case, it considers that there was no public interest existed. The US voters got
trapped, and this fraud resulted in hijacking their data along with their friend's data
(Acs.org.au, 2014). These were mainly the Facebook users, and it would not be
wrong to consider that this scandal was just the manipulation of their voting
intentions. Therefore, from the perspective of this ACS value, this case is entirely
unethical.
The Enhancement of Life Quality
This ACS value implies striving towards the quality enhancement of the life of people
affected by one’s act. It simply means putting efforts for improving the life quality of
all those who are associated with or impacted from work done by one. It nowhere
realised in the Cambridge Analytica-Facebook scenario that any of the persons
involved had made efforts for the people associated with them. This scenario had
affected adversely the lives of the stakeholders instead of enhancing the quality of
their life (Lusher, 2018). The general public had to lose their personal information by
logging and participating in the survey on “thisisyourdigitallife”. Requirements of this
value did not find implementation which shows that this case is not ethical under the
light of this value as well.
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Honesty
Honesty represents the moral characteristics of a human such as truthfulness and
integrity as well as cutting out the deception, fraud, manipulation, lying, and cheating.
Being an ACS member, honesty requires reflection of honesty while representing
one’s knowledge, products, skills, or services. The senior executives of CA and other
involved members were not honest in their intentions when they conducted the
survey requiring the Facebook login. Absence of honesty indicates the existence of
unethical practice (Acs.org.au, 2014).
Competence
Competence in ACS shows working with due diligence and competency for the sake
of the stakeholders. The scenario of this data hijacking scandal proves that the
competence had used with evil intentions for unethical purposes. The senior
executives of CA made false representation to Steve Bannon and the fund-giver
member Robert Mercer. The main aim in this whole scenario was influencing the
voting intentions of the people towards Donald Trump during his presidential
campaigns. This scandal resulted in the loss of personal data and manipulations in
the voting intentions of the US people (Illing, 2018). Therefore, there nowhere seen
that the activities undertaken for the sake of the stakeholders that are the general
public.
Professional Development
The ACS value of professional development reflects the enhancement in the
professional development of oneself as well as that of the staff members or
colleagues. Professional development terms as the improvement process of
capabilities with the use of training and education (Lusher, 2018). The scandal of
data hijacking exposed through the undercover operation and the further
investigation led to the suspension of the involved members and termination of the
whole organisation.
Professionalism
The professionalism in ACS is evident from the integration of all the ACS values
along with respect towards the ACS members. All the values mentioned above
constitute the structure of professionalism which was absent in the scandal of data
mining by Cambridge Analytica. Unprofessional behaviour of the senior executives of
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