In the article entitled “Why the Equifax Breach Stings So Bad”, Ron Lieber speaks about post equifax breach remarks and feelings that many harbor toward equifax. He even goes as far to criticize the way they had always been operating their business, stating that they sell their client’s data any way that ultimately brings them money, and stating the entire process for individuals to find out if they were actually affected by the breach is a utter chaotic nightmare. In the midst of these statements Lieber also incorporates into his report that really all three of the credit bureaus, not just equifax have extremely too much power in an individual’s life. He elaborates further by stating that equifax works closely with FICO to come up with a credit score through random algorithms that are not released to the public and these scores state if you can get what you want or not. This reveals that equifax has a huge impact on people’s life and limitations, and for them to not only allow a breach to occur but to then not take any accountability for the situation is careless and has left many feeling utterly hopeless. Ultimately, while the breach has harmed everyone with credit involved with equifax, it mostly affected those with decent credit history because their good standings would be ruined. Scammers and thieves can really do as they please with stolen data and credit until sought out. The main reason for why I feel this breach was morally wrong is because equifax did not take any accountability. In this case analysis I will argue that consequentialism shows us that the Equifax breach harmed everyone with credit by not taking any responsibility and that this was morally wrong.

In the document entitled the social responsibility of a business is to increase its profits, Milton Friedman is frequently throughout makes cases to argue his point of view that businesses are to prioritize giving money back to shareholders and that they do not have to feel obligated to do anything with the money they then acquire, they may do as they please as they see fit. He starts off by stating that the phrase “social responsibility“ is such a broad term and can be swayed, manipulated, and is not concrete to say the least. He proceeds by stating that only individual people can have responsibilities and corporations are not individuals but are of course made up of individuals. He admits “A corporation is an artificial person and in this sense may have artificial responsibilities, but “business” as a whole cannot be said to have responsibilities, even in this vague sense.” To elaborate upon his claim he proceeds by going into what he sees as actual responsibilities of individuals within corporations, more specifically the corporate executives. He begins this subject by basically stating executives are obligated to fulfill the desires of their employers which in most cases happen to be making them money. In other words this is essentially their responsibility as an individual executive. They are to fulfill this responsibility through any means necessary as long as it abides by the boundaries placed by ethical and legislative regulators (society as far as an ethical standpoint goes). He almost mockingly addresses an opposing view to his argument by stating that the executive may spend money on outside things that are not work related for reasons or incentives that he or she may deem as worthy, ending the statement with “If we wish, we may refer to some of these responsibilities as “social responsibilities.” To summarize the point he was making, Friedman says that “social responsibility” for executives would require them to not abide by the responsibilities given to them by their employers. That “social responsibility” would be for the betterment of society, for example intentionally avoiding increasing prices on goods to eliminate a business’s contribution to inflation. Needless to say this would help out consumers because they will not need more money to obtain what they need, and harm the executive’s employer’s because the executive is not making as much money as he or she could have. Friedman says the executive is spending the shareholder’s , his employee’s , and his customer’s money in the exhibition of the previous scenario. This type of view on this matter definitely twists the definition of utilitarianism quite a bit, an executive would only be purposely avoiding raising his prices on goods and/or services to aid society which would be of utilitarian value because he chose aiding humanity of his own workplace and employers. But Friedman is stating by believing in those principles that the executive would in fact be harming society. I feel that Friedman’s view on the matter is corrupted and does not accurately reflect what is being done to uphold social responsibility; However, I agree with the mantra he is trying to preach that acting in greed is not always bad only if the intent is not to destroy but to build. If building up yourself is supposed to build up others in any kind of way then that social responsibility is acquired with the intent that it will better society.

In the document entitled “Changing the Social Contract: A Role for Business” written by Melvin Anshen, He states that there is a “social contract” between society and businesses. Ashen begins by stating the pressures that are placed on corporate officers as a result of them having to pay their employers which ultimately can only be done by obtaining a successful business. Theoretically speaking the contract entails businesses mass producing goods and services for the general society and society in return will compensate businesses for those things. They ultimately feed off one another in a sense, business would obviously fail and go bankrupt without customers looking to shop for their everyday essentials and luxuries, and people would suffer without a doubt if business was not promoted everywhere even if there was an alternative way of distributing goods and services without the need of businesses. To back that statement, Anshen actually says that businesses are critical to overall society, calling them an organ metaphorizing the human body. To elaborate the same way an organ has a duty to the rest of the body for example the heart pumping blood throughout the body, businesses have the duty of pumping out resources throughout the region, state, country, or globe. With this ideology in mind Ashen stresses that it is imperative that businesses understand their role amongst society (organ in a human body) and how it has been and is still changing and how they must act accordingly to stay ahead of the game. I believe at this point in the text that he is indirectly making implications to the point in history when corporations had to make severe changes in the way they were going about their business, more specifically around the time of the new deal that was put in place by FDR, which he had specifically referenced earlier within the text. Preceding the new deal was the industrial revolution in which businesses were mostly being run with minimal regard for the protocols that were put in effect by the New Deal. The main reason for that being the case was that the U.S. needed that era of history to develop fully into the juggernaut of a country that it is currently. Now that America is far more developed and that there are a lot more pressing issues currently affecting our country, climate change for example, society has placed an enormous spotlight on the priority of the betterment of everyone’s lives and health and is very effective at boycotting sources that do not bring those factors to everyone, especially business that appear to be corrupt, discriminative, or unsafe. That concept has replaced what used to be the concept of increasing the economy by any means. Now with this type of perspective Anshen does not incorporate social responsibilities within the roles of businesses. In order for such a contract to work is if companies understand and fully fulfill their responsibilities without violating consumer rights and liberties. Citizens of society have a lot of power and can destroy business so I believe Anshen is attempting to inform businesses that they have to alter their ways of conducting business in a way that will fit in with the logic of society or at least in a way that can manipulate legislative and social constraints to help them. An example of failure by a corporation and therefore violation of the contract can be found with Equifax and their contract with their customers. They allowed a data breach to occur resulting in customers not feeling safe upholding their part of the contract (shopping with the business and promoting their overall well being). I believe that people do fear uncertainty and helplessness, so when consumers can not be sure what to expect from the business they have a relationship and there is a looming potential for theft and other types of harm of course they will not bother to conduct business with them. Equifax apparently does not understand that concept but as Anshen suggests, other businesses must understand that in order to stay above the curve or even stay afloat really. 

Throughout all of these texts there have been certain bits of pieces that can be pulled from all of them to promote a healthy outlook for business and society relationships. This can be created by pulling what should not occur from (equifax data breach) and pulling together some decent ideologies which were exhibited in both other documents. Ultimately when you look at that equifax scenario you can not possibly come out of it without trying to place some sort of blame on equifax. Credit can really make or break an individual and is in some cases as important as actual currency. With that being said, Equifax should have been well aware of this and I’m not saying they should have foreseen this coming, but they definitely need to take more responsibility for their mistakes and the consequences that an enormous part of society that has conducted business with them now must deal with.  I’ve never had anything like this ever happen to me so I could not possibly relate to the amount of panic those people must be going through. But it does not take much of a psychiatrist to come to an understanding that the amount must be overwhelming. The actions exhibited by Equifax once again were morally wrong.