So, perhaps there are ways we can learn about better tech ethics by looking at what works well in security. It’s not all of ethics (there are other ways that folk can be harmed by code that doesn’t require third parties and code exploits) but a subset. This seems to imply security is an aspect of ethics. Similarly, the main aim of security is to try to protect users from people who want to hurt or rob them through our systems. I defined tech ethics as protecting users from harm where we can. Could we be a last bastion of defence or is it someone else’s problem? What does ethics have to do with security anyway? That’s one of us intelligent and thoughtful engineers. Someone has to design them, write them, deploy them and operate them. That’s so intimidating it makes me feel like I can’t possibly have any impact on it - tech-driven culture is a juggernaut for someone else, more important than me, to worry about. If we screw things up we potentially affect billions of individuals. Energy use, pollution, exclusion, fake news, manipulation, physical danger, propaganda, mental health - there’s a huge list of areas where we could make things worse for some parts of society. But, we’re suddenly realising there are lots of ways our output could damage folk, which we need to be careful about. I love our industry of intelligent, thoughtful engineers. Technology can be an amazing force for good. Tech ethics is about avoidance of harm in all forms from the mundane to the futuristic. We could be talking about boring stuff like losing all their data (faulty backups) or newer things like subjecting them to arbitrary decisions (algorithmic fairness). I’d define tech ethics as trying our best to prevent our code from hurting users or anyone else. We are all allowed to consider the rights and wrongs of our code, to say what we think, and to act. We’re just going to have to learn it together. Adopt the right emerging trends at QCon San Francisco (Oct 2-6, 2023)! Get actionable advice for your engineering challenges.
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