Ethical and Sustainability Issue: Google's Privacy - MGT301A Report

This report examines the ethical and sustainability issues concerning Google's privacy practices. The report begins with a brief overview of the company and its operations. The core of the report focuses on the ethical challenges posed by Google's data collection and use, including concerns about user privacy, data encryption, and stakeholder impacts. The analysis delves into the specific ethical issues, such as the collection of user data, and the potential for misuse. The report also identifies key stakeholders affected by these issues, including Google's employees, advertisers, communities, investors, users, and the government. To address these ethical concerns, the report suggests that the organization should improve its data encryption systems. The report concludes by emphasizing the importance of ethical conduct for the success and sustainability of businesses. This report is a valuable resource for students studying business ethics and sustainability, offering insights into real-world ethical dilemmas and potential solutions.

Kabita Shrestha
ETHICS
How can google improve the privacy of its users?
Google Company was formed by Sergey Brin and Larry Page when they were schooling
at Stanford University. The official launching of the company was done in 1998. The company
grew into a multinational organization through its search engine. The company has enterprises
which include cloud computing, internet analytic, web app, and browser. The company has some
several issues affecting it.
Among the ethical problems facing the stakeholders of Google is privacy. Google
collects a lot of data about persons who use the search engine. Although it keeps records of the
searches that are made by people as a tool to enhance cooperate efficiency, the company makes
the data impersonal after a duration of nine months and erases the cookies used to track users
after a span of two years (Shaman, 2019). The state could use the information from Google to
carry an investigation about an individual’s visiting specific websites. On the other hand, there
have been complaints about google privacy. The google earth’s photo has raised a question about
its privacy (Ma, et al., 2012). There was a couple who sued Google in 2008 regarding the photos
of their home since they viewed it as a violation of privacy.
Google’s main stakeholders include employees, advertisers, communities, investors,
Google users, and the government. The organization should improve its data encryption systems
in order to solve the privacy issue. Ethics is important in business since it may either lead to its
failure or success. Companies’ should ensure that they are operating ethically in order to operate
effectively.
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Kabita Shrestha
References
Shaman, F. (2019). Ethical Issues Among Stakeholders in Google. Retrieved from
https://smallbusiness.chron.com/ethical-issues-among-stakeholders-google-30716.html
Ma, Z., Liang, D., Yu, K. H., & Lee, Y. (2012). Most cited business ethics publications:
Mapping the intellectual structure of business ethics studies in 2001–2008. Business
Ethics: A European Review, 21(3), 286-297.
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