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  

Nathaniel Bradley  

PHIL355E  

  

  

This course has had a profound effect on my thoughts on cybersecurity ethics. The three main topics that have stuck with me in this course are information warfare, whistleblowing, and privacy ethics. Each of these topics has helped shape my thinking and challenge what I thought I knew about these topics prior. This course has helped me understand the ethical nuances in these types of situations.  

  

Initially, I did not have strong options on the idea of information warfare because I had never thought about it from this perspective. I imagined Information warfare as something that only affected governments and militaries in the cyber world. Now I have a better understanding that information warfare is deeply rooted in psychology, societal divisions, and human behavior. As an example, the use of social media “trending” to push agendas from other countries. In the future, I want to make sure to look closely at things such as social media posts and recognize active information warfare when I see it.  

  

Before this course, I saw whistleblowing as a straightforward act of exposing wrongdoings in a company that you disagree with. If I were asked if a whistleblower had loyalty or the company, I would have always said no but it’s much more nuanced than that. Someone can be a whistleblower because they believe it’s better for the company so they can get back to what they stand for. Each case has its own ethical gray area that is not easy to navigate. I gained a deep admiration for the people who end up being whistleblowers because of the danger involved with that decision. For the future, I want to remember that whistleblowing is not inherently bad and can be a good tool for exposing the failures of an organization.  

  

Privacy ethics is something I had a straightforward mindset about. Everyone should be entitled to privacy at all times and it’s a fundamental right. This course revealed the complex tradeoffs involved with people having privacy, especially in contexts like public safety, surveillance, and data-driven technologies. Also showed me that some people chose to opt out of this privacy like when posting on social media all the time. This course also highlighted how companies can take user data without consent and violate people’s privacy every day with targeted ads or selling their information. One takeaway I have is that in the future I want to remember that privacy is a right but only if you use it.  

  

In conclusion, this course has helped me understand many ethical dilemmas that are currently happening in the world. Through the lens of information warfare, whistleblowing, and privacy ethics, this course has deepened my understanding of the ethical challenges in a rapidly evolving digital landscape. Each of these topics has helped me understand the nuance of ethical dilemmas and how to use critical thinking to work with them. In the future I plan to use these ideas to help me explore ethical problems I will have with a better understanding and greater thoughtfulness.