Electronic information has replaced paper files in the Information Age, optimizing transactions, personal records, and communication across the World Wide Web. Talking online with someone in another country in minutes rather than weeks or months is a feat only thought possible in science fiction. The Internet revolutionized not only the field of information technology but thousands of professions and careers.

But with the increasing evolution of technology and its intricacies forever being taken advantage of, even the most cutting-edge cybersecurity programs still need humans to maintain security protocols, especially when it comes to storing data and information. A person’s data online should be as protected as though it were gathered behind a locked door and stored in a vault.

However, data storage and protection isn’t as cut and dried in practice as it is in theory. There are four different ethical issues concerning data privacy:

• Protecting data from unauthorized access
• Accuracy of data procured by automated collectors
• Availability of data to legal owners
• Inappropriate uses or inappropriate means of collecting data

According to isasca.org: “Data privacy protection is complex due to socio-techno risk, a new security concern. This risk occurs with the abuse of technology that is used to store and process data.” Data breaches can happen on purpose and on accident. For instance, if a company employee takes home a USB drive with privileged, protected data stored on it and the data happens to be stolen through the employee’s personal computer or device, they could be held accountable.

Sometimes the bureaucratic red tape, firewalls, and physical barriers around personal data can be tedious to cross through if you are the authorized user to the data you wish to access. However, this is the point of such cybersecurity hurdles, to make it difficult to access the data stored within the company’s network infrastructure. After all, what’s worse? Having to wait a few days to access your data or cleaning up a massive data breach resultant of lapse security protocols?

In comparison to the United States, did you know that Scandinavian countries have the most secure cybersecurity systems? According to compirtech.com, Finland only hosts a 1.06% of cell phones infected with malware and only a tiny 0.02% in Demark are affected by ransomware. Y’all want to emigrate to Denmark with me?

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