This was a discussion about the difference between USA and European Laws about the digital world.

     I feel the United States of American should adopt laws and practices like the privacy laws in the European Union.  The European Union are enacting laws to help better protect the people of their territories and countries.  They are putting the people before everything else including taxes and company profits.  This group of laws will help protect the people equally across the European business and personal digital battlefield.  The laws will set strict guidelines to protect the peoples’ data.  These laws also, come with punishments for not complying with the laws or guidelines.  The punishments are also leveled in ways to equal the companies lack of control or compliance. So, the more a company does not comply or do what it is supposed to do the more money the company stands to lose.  So, I will argue that Deontology will show us the United States of America should follow or even exceed the European Unions lead in digital data laws, because the companies are doing good but not for the right reasons.  The laws are being enacted for the good of the customer and for the right reasons.

     In the Zimmer article, the research study was done to follow activities on- line.  The study subjects were not aware or asked if they wanted to be involved in the study.  The researchers who were trying to study the on-line activities of the subjects over a predetermined time period.  The researchers did in there minds enough to protect the unknowing subjects’ identities.  They felt that what they did would protect them from being outed once the study was published.  What the researchers found out soon after publishing the study, was that every single person that was followed was outed.  The measures that the researchers used for the security of the subjects was not well thought out.  The measures were further not tested or tried, nor were they run by a person with knowledge of data security. This mis step not talking or requiring a person with knowledge of data security, showed that the researchers did not respect the dignity of the test subjects. The subjects not knowing they were being tracked and be used in a research paper. This data was easily used to connect the dots to figure out who each of the subjects were.  They failed to protect the data of these people from being used to show what they were doing on-line during the years the study followed them. The end results of the people being outed did not physically or emotional harm them, but it still attacked the people’s dignity.  The people were hurt on another level.  Their information was easily pinpointed to them. Them being pinpointed single them out, from just another faceless web surfer, to hey that is the person in that study.  The actions of the researchers was lazy and not very moral.  They tired to use well this information is already public and out the as excuse for their lazy attempt at protecting the study subjects.  The researchers had good intensions but they failed to follow through to protect the subjects.  This is bad morally because they did not even test their protections to see if they would stand up to even a little scrutiny.  They did not even run this by a person with knowledge of data protection.  This was skipped to speed up their time- table or just plain incompetence by the researchers.  Both of the reasons are proof that the researchers were in it for themselves but not to protect the study subjects.  The subjects’ data privacy should have been paramount in the study.  The researchers had a duty to them because, the subjects did not know they were even being followed.  The researchers failed because they thought their study was more important than the subjects’ rights. The argument of the data is already public by the researchers has no legs to stand on.  Yes, true this data is “out there” and “public” but the study brought all the data and public information into one area to be seen without any protections.  The study is how with the lack of even simple protection, the subjections were easily identified.  The subjects along with being identified were also judged and hurt by what the studies information provided to the general public.  There should be better and stricter guidelines in research and general areas where data is being gathered, analyzed, and stored to protect the people or subjects.  The researchers may have had a great idea for the study but their laziness made it morally bad.  This need to protect the dignity of who the data is should be the upmost importance.  Great ideas and so- called harmless uses of the data can still kill the dignity of the people the data is coming from.  Hurting them not in ways that my keep them from wanting to use the technology that is out there to help them.  Governing rules for data collection and uses of the collected data need to take dignity of the people that are providing the data into consideration.

   Buchanan’s article is about the use of data mining and privacy.  The article covers the use of data mining by governments in the search of people or groups who are helping terrorist organizations.  This is the biggest Deontology conundrum, the idea is a well thought out one for use of it to keep people safe.  This also runs right over any privacy or ethical rights of all people.  The governments and intelligent agencies are using false pretenses to mine this data for safety reasons.  I will admit that the world has changed and so does the fight for intelligence and keeping the people of your country safe.  The idea of using data mining to find nuggets of intelligence and information is a proper and probably very useful.  This is especially true in this modern digital age.  This issues lie again in how the services are being mined and if the data should be mined at all.  The people being mined should have the right to know that any information may be used against them.  The people may be blowing off frustrations and steam and saying things that might just be that just words.  Those words may find them on lists that they do not know about.  They may be thrown on a watch list, where with or without a warrant they are further watched by an agency.  The people should also be aware when their information is even being used in the mining for the advertising world.  The mining can lead to loads of targeted ads that do not fit your normal activities, because of a bad day.

    The issue with data mining is who is watching the ethical or moral use of this data, even if the gathering of the data is even moral or ethical.  All things information by or for the government should have oversight.  The agencies need other agencies to help watch, what is gathered and why, and how the gathered info is used or even analysis.  The government agencies miss handle or miss analysis this information about people could lead to harm of quality of life.  It could lead to many problems for people including being put on no-fly lists.  The average person does not have access to teams of lawyers to clear their names.  We also all know how hard it is to get a government bureaucracy to do anything in a timely manner.  The government intelligence agencies are using the justification of safety and hunting down the bad guys to mine the data that should be private information of the people.  This is why we need to go further then the European protections for data, we need to add oversight to government agencies that want the data and use the data.  We need strict guidelines that the agencies have to follow to obtain and use the data.  The governments may be doing so called good things but the way they are getting it is not ethical.  This mining may lead to the hurting of a person’s name and reputation for nothing more than saying an opinion on something.  The right thing is to have a proper set of rules to analysis and treat the information they get, even try to restrict the excess to the data.

    In conclusion I feel the European Unions’ laws should be at minimum the floor for which the countries of the world start.  Oversight for the government agencies needs to be added for there to be a workable amount of privacy for the people.  I know the major attack on this thought we be the fact that they are using this data for good.  They are using it to find the bad guy before something else happens.  I would argue against that point that how reliable is the data?  How will the formulas or whatever they use to scrub the data, be sure not to discriminate against the Islamic world.  They to have bad days and the internet is a great way to blow off steam and express your frustrations.  How will your machine account for this not to interfere or destroy an innocent person?  I will agree that the agencies do not need to have their hands tied and never have access to big data, but I want oversight and guidelines they need to follow.