IT Communication Assignment
Assignment 2 ICT710
Assessment and Submission
Details
Task
Edward Snowden—an employee of defence contractor Booz Allen Hamilton,
working at the National Security Agency (NSA)—is responsible for what may turn
out to be the most significant leak of classified information in U.S. history.
In June 2013, Snowden admitted to passing classified documents to reporters at
The Guardian and The Washington Post—revealing details of NSA surveillance
programs that collect and perform data mining on hundreds of millions of U.S.
phone and Internet traffic records to identify possible links to known
terrorists. Shortly after leaking the documents, Snowden fled the country to
avoid federal charges. Some people call Snowden a whistle-blower for drawing
attention to NSA programs they feel violate civil rights and the Constitution.
Others consider him a traitor and feel he should be heavily prosecuted. Please
research this incident and write the report as indicated in this task.
Doing Ethics Technique –
Hints and Tips
The 'Doing Ethics' technique is a process for
analysing ethical issues in any scenario. It doesn't guarantee that what you
come up with will be the best solution, but it does help you to think
ethically. The technique may seem a little vague and perhaps lacking guidance,
however the following might help you to understand how to apply the technique
in order to better understand ethical analysis.
Q1. What's going on?
This is a synopsis of what the case is all about. It
can be taken from a variety of perspectives, for example, from the perspective
of a person raising a complaint, in which case, it is a synopsis of the
complaint. It can be taken from the perspective of an involved observer, in
which case, it is an outline of what was observed, without going into too much
detail. Where you see multiple perspectives, you should describe them here.
Q2. What are the facts?
This is a descriptive list of the facts of the case.
This doesn't just describe the case; it lists the facts as they are known (from
all sources and perspectives), and also what one might reasonably consider to
be possibilities. For example, if a person was raising a complaint, Question 1
would outline their complaint, and Question 2 would provide the evidence to
both support and refute that argument. All such facts must be demonstrable or
supportable. It would be worthwhile to assign a credibility weighting to each
fact, to help with later analysis.
Q3. What are the issues?
This is a list of ALL the issues that are involved in
the case. In Question 5 we can extract only the ethical issues for further
analysis, but for now, simply extract and describe every relevant issue you can
think of.
Q4. Who is affected?
This is a list of all the stakeholders involved in the
case. This need not be restricted to the ones specifically mentioned in the
case; you should consider who/what else might be affected by the issues listed
at Question 3, regardless of the degree to which they are affected. In this
question, you should describe how each stakeholder is affected, both positively
and negatively, and perhaps comment on the degree of effect.
Q5. What are the ethical
issues and implications?
For this question, you need to extract only the
ethical issues identified at Question 3. List the ethical issues, discuss them
in terms of classical ethical theory (as best you can), and discuss their
implications - on the stakeholders and on the community in general.
Q6. What can be done about
it?
This question elicits a general idea of what can be
done to resolve the case, whether those ideas are practical, possible, or not.
Generally what kind of resolutions might there be? You need not go into great
detail to answer this question, as its purpose is to provide a basis for
answering Question 7, but you do need to think broadly and laterally to come up
with several alternatives.
Q7. What are the options?
This question requires that you list and describe (in
detail) all the possible options that might be available to resolve the case.
Be creative here; the most obvious options are not always the best. It's
possible that not all options will result in a positive outcome for all
stakeholders. List and describe at least three different options, and discuss
the benefits and detriments of each.
Q8. Which option is best -
and why?
In answering this question, you need to assess which
of the options described in Question 7 is the best. You are recommending one of
several options here, so you need to argue for your recommendation, providing a
solid basis in fact and reasonable (and supportable) conjecture. You should add
some of your own intellectual property, as an ICT professional, into answering
this question. Supporting your argument based on classical ethical theory is
not a requirement at this point, but it is what would be expected if you were a
professional Ethicist.
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