Analyzing Ethical Dilemmas with the Doing Ethics Technique

The essay explores the application of the Doing Ethics Technique (DET) to analyze an ethical dilemma concerning the premature launch of a project named Willis without encrypted code. The company's CEO pressures for an early release to secure future contracts, while Gregg, a key figure in the development team, highlights the importance of encryption for security and professional integrity. DET analysis is employed to systematically address aspects such as facts, issues, affected parties, implications, and potential solutions. It emphasizes that delivering quality service should take precedence over immediate profits and that transparency with clients or hiring additional resources would have been more ethical alternatives. The essay concludes by underscoring the necessity of prioritizing security measures in software development for maintaining trust and upholding professional ethics.

Running head: DOING ETHICS TECHNIQUE
DOING ETHICS TECHNIQUE
Name of Student
Name of University
Author note
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The purpose of this essay is to analyze a situation of ethical dilemma with the help of
Doing Ethics Technique (DET). The scenario chosen for this analysis is the “early launch of
Willis project without the incorporation of encrypted code in the software”. DET is an age old
tool for critically analyzing ethical issues that can arise in the workplace. DET analysis is done
by questioning the various aspects that could crop up from the concerned ethical issue. Questions
regarding the facts and issues of the ethical dilemma, who are getting affected from the decision,
what are implications, how the situation can be addressed, what are the possible solutions and
best solution among all are considered while analyzing the situation of ethical dilemma (Stout &
LOVE, 2013).
In the given scenario, the concerned company’s CEO was pressurizing for the early
launch of the Willis project without encryption. As per the CEO, if the Willis project was
delivered on time this could confirm their next contract worth 3 million but Gregg was
concerned about the security implication of the project. Gregg was seen explaining his senior the
significance of encryption in the project. He even mentioned that the senior developer, David
also considers encryption as a vital aspect for the Willer system and in the process he might find
it difficult to deliver the project early from the stipulated time but Gregg’s boss was seen more
concerned about the future contracts. He suggested Gregg that the encryption software could be
updated in a month’s time after the launch. He tried to convince Gregg by stating that on
successful delivery of the project Gregg’s team may earn healthy incentives even after knowing
that the software could have possible chances of being hacked without encryption (YouTube,
2018).
Considering DET analyses for the given scenario, the first question that crop up in mind
is what are the facts related to such situations of ethical dilemma. Encryption is crucial for any

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developing software. It is essential that the vital information that the software incorporates is
kept confidential to prevent unauthorized sources to access the confidential. In the recent times,
several attacks due to weak encryption are witnessed (Morales-Sandoval & Diaz-Perez, 2015).
As per the DET analysis, the second question that must be answered to analysis this situation is
what are the issues that can arise from the given scenario. The issues that can arise are after the
launch of the project, the system might get vulnerable to hacking. Although Gregg’s boss
suggests that the probability of the system getting hacked is too low but even the low probability
can pose a threat to the system. Other than this, the reputation of the company that is delivering
the project can be at stake if any security issues arise after launch, this in turn can also hamper
the company’s relationship with its client. The third question of the DET analysis addresses who
are the people that can get affected from the decision. In context of the above-discussed scenario,
the concerned company’s team members who are currently working on the project as well as the
stakeholders of the Willis project will be affected from this situation of ethical dilemma. In case
of early launch, Gregg’s team members have to change their working pace in order to deliver
their project on time also the Willis Company might get affected from the project depending on
the project outcome. Considering the DET analysis for the above-discussed situation it can be
said that, encryption is an essential part of any project. A project cannot be considered as fully
complete until it is provided with properly encrypted software. The decision of delivering the
Willis project without encryption cannot be considered ethical (Langheinrich et al., 2013). Apart
from this, Gregg’s boss was more concerned about the company profits rather than delivering
quality service to the Willis Company this also violates professional ethics also convincing team
members to do task even it is not ethical by the means of bonuses and incentives is also not
appropriate. In context of the given scenario, if DET analysis is taken into account the next

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question that crop up is about the possible solutions related to the situation of ethical dilemma.
The company could have proposed the Willis Company regarding their decision of launching of
the project without encryption, if the Willis Company have agreed with the decision then this
decision could have been considered as ethical up to some extinct, the other solution could have
been to hire more team members to deliver the project at urgent basis. Considering these two
possible solutions, the second option can be considered as the best solution as this would not
only help the company to complete the project at early basis but also help them in delivering
quality product to the Willis Company.
As per the DET analysis of the given scenario, it can be concluded that the delivering of
quality service is more essential rather than solely focusing on the company profits. DET
analysis provided an apt solution in context of the above-discussed problem. Gregg’s boss could
have suggested hiring more team members in order to meet the deadline rather than
compromising with the software security. Even the low chance of data getting hacked could have
created a bad reputation for the company. Other than this, employees must be motivated with
extra incentives to work in a more professional manner rather than submitting a project without
creating proper security measures.

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References
Langheinrich, M., Schmidt, A., Davies, N., & José, R. (2013, June). A practical framework for
ethics: the PD-net approach to supporting ethics compliance in public display studies.
In Proceedings of the 2nd ACM International Symposium on Pervasive Displays (pp.
139-143). ACM.
Morales-Sandoval, M., & Diaz-Perez, A. (2015, August). DET-ABE: A Java API for data
confidentiality and fine-grained access control from attribute based encryption. In IFIP
International Conference on Information Security Theory and Practice (pp. 104-119).
Springer, Cham.
Stout, M., & LOVE, J. M. (2013). Ethical choice making. Public Administration Quarterly, 280-
296.
YouTube. (2018). Scenario 3: Early Launch. [online] Available at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v5M7ohdZ6qA [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018].