Cybersecurity Ethics

This course examines ethical issues relevant to ethics for cybersecurity professionals, including privacy, professional code of conduct, practical conflicts between engineering ethics and business practices, individual and corporate social responsibility, ethical hacking, information warfare, and cyberwarfare. Students will gain a broad understanding of central issues in cyberethics and the ways that fundamental ethical theories relate to these core issues.

Course Material

Reflection essay

This semester has been very challenging for me. I was faced with many obstacles, but I kept on pushing and now I am here at the end of the semester looking back and reflecting on what I have learned in this class. I have had an interest in philosophy and while taking this course it has broadened my perspective in the way I look at things.one of the many things that I admire about the subject of philosophy is it never ceases to amaze me on the way the suject analyzes things. 

While taking this class many topics have picked my interest, some of them have even made me do a more in-depth research about them. Of all the topics that we covered in class I was more drawn to these three topics, and they are Ubuntu, consequentialism, and Deontology. Although the rest of the topics are very much interesting these three have caught my attention because they looked relevant to my life.

The first topic that caught my attention was the philosophical idea of Ubuntu. It is a central moral principle in the sub-saharan African ethical system. The word Ubuntu translates to humanness or humanity. In fact the idea is “ A person is a person through other persons” which means that a community is a very important factor. Before learning about ubuntu i have never released how important a community is, i knew it was important but i never thought about its importance that much. However after gaining new knowledge and understanding my position has changed in the way that I view the importance of community. 

Many things can be said about consequentialism, but to summarize consequentialism focuses on the consequences of the actions people take. For someone that is a consequentialist an action is right if the consequences are good, and wrong if the consequences are bad. This made a lot of sense to me because that is how our world works, depending on the actions that we take it either has a good consequences or a bad one. Until not so long ago I have always thought that despite the actions that a person takes if they had a good reason it was just and fair regardless of the consequences. However, after being introduced to the idea of consequentialism and reading a little bit more about it, my position and the way I think about reasons being enough to dismiss bad consequences have very much changed.

The last topic to grab my attention is  deontology. It is the branch of philosophy that focuses on people’s reasons for acting in considering whether a particular action is right or wrong. Immanuel Kant, a famous philosopher, stated that “ one could do something that resulted in good things but that was motivated by bad reasons. When this happens, the person has still done something wrong.” In deontology the actions aren’t the only thing that’s important, it’s also the reason behind it that is important. This has helped be gain nuance because actions and reason are one and the same.