Ethics in the digital world - Information Gathering

The ethics of insight in the digital world is a topic that I have found very difficult to establish an opinion about. The quick evolution of the digital world has left behind not only users but also rule makers to define what is right or not when it comes to the web. Some governments have worked on policies to try to protect the privacy of their citizens in the web. One of the cases that I remember was a couple years ago Germany prohibited Google to use the street view application in the country, arguing this application intruded the privacy of the German people. This fact can be viewed as an exaggeration for some people but legitimate for some others. One could argue this is an intrusion to the “real” privacy of people who did not want the images of their houses in internet when they did not sign up for any related service or were asked for. However when it comes to “online information” that the people is freely uploading, is this a intrusion or is part of the service they are receiving?

The point is that the ethics in the internet is still in development, and there are not clear rules on what is right or not in the digital world, there is anything such as a universal ethical code. Since the digital world has not borders and involves so many different cultures, the task to unify a single code seems to be the main challenge.

The light regulation of the data gathering created a new business model for the internet where companies such Rapleaf are profiting with people information; this new business model is based on intensive surveillance of people to sell data about, and predictions of, their interests and activities. However as the articles show, many times they are getting more sensitive personal information that is not relevant for marketing purposes like real names, ID numbers, addresses and location in real time.

I have some arguments in favor of this practice but also I have others against it, but I cannot establish my real position about it.

In favor to this practice I would say that:

-          It has never been easier than today to get valuable insight about group of people and especially about customers.

-          This information, when used in correctly can be of a big advantage not only for companies and marketers but also for consumers. As the RapLeaf CEO Auren Hoffman says “…a more personalizable world is a better world”.

-          Many of the online services, specially the social media are free of charge. Users should be conscious that nothing is for free and they are paying for the service they receive by using the information they are loading when using this kind of services. That is the case of the Google search engine, you can use it for “free” but in reality you are paying back by providing information on what your interest for information are.

-          Users should be expected to be accountable for their actions. For this I mean for sharing information, ultimately they are the ones that freely decide what information to load in internet. They should be aware that the web is more a public place.

Against the practice one could argue that:

-          Users are not being asked for permission on how the information can be used or not. At least it is not in a clear way. Even when the services provide disclosures clauses, those are made in a way that few of the users will go through the entire document.

-          Tracking your behavior on line is one thing but installing cookies in your computer to track you offline is a total different thing. Here they are trespassing to private property (your computer) and it is not clear what can of information they could get from it. It is very likely that the user has personal information that could be gathered through this mean which would not be right.

-          When signing to a web service, your ultimate goal is not to load information to share with everybody. In cases like Facebook or Myspace, users’ intentions are to share their personal life with family and friends not for analysis or sale it.

-          There is no an entity in charge to regulate what information may or may not be gathered from the internet, so the criterion of what is right or not depends on the companies sharing their user information.  What is wrong for one company may not be wrong for another, even further, what is wrong in wrong in one country may not be wrong in others.

-          When companies are gathering information necessary to market research is a good practice, however as the WSJ.com exposed in its article “A web Pioneer Profiles Users by Name”, companies such RapLeaf are collecting more than necessary data such as names and ID numbers. There is nobody really taking care that they are doing what they say about what information they are being able to collect.

The only think that is clear to me is that in the future we can expect more regulations to appear in this topic; regulations that help to protect the personal information in internet. The new framework should include not only rules  and standards for the information gathering and use but also ways to make sure the companies comply with it. In the mean the ethical decision will rely on the companies gathering the information, buyers of the information and marketers using it.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703977004575393173432219064.html