The professionals in computing are known for performing various tasks which may include the writing of the specifications of the new computer systems, designing the pipelines instructions for processors of superscalar, diagnosing the time of anomalies in systems that are embedded, they do testing and validation of the software systems, they do restructuring of back end Dbs. for inventory systems, also they do the analysis of the packet traffic in LANs and recommending the security polices for the IS in medical world. These professionals in computing are obliged in performing the above discussed tasks punctiliously as any decisions they make will affect the working and performance of the system and which in turn may affect the user of the computer system either directly or indirectly. Their obligations are similar to those of other professionals in other fields like engineering.
When we take together their obligations then it is referred as the professional ethics. When we bring the term ethics then we have to articulate within the disciplines of philosophies whereby we define ethics as the study of actions that an individual who is responsible is supposed to choose, the values that make one to be an honourable individual and lastly is the character that an individual who is virtuous should portray. Some of this behaviours include things like being honest, showing respect, trustworthy, fair, kind and being civil. The ethical obligations of computing professionals must comply with the laws and regulations set by the nation. In the field of ICT the computing professional entails so many things from the H/W designers, S/W engineers, Db administrators, System analysts and the computer scientists. Many professions who exhibits similar characteristics are referred to as strongly differentiated professions (Goldman, 2000). Some of the characteristics defining this strongly differentiated profession are the skills and the specialized knowledge, systematic research etc.
Professionals have been known in valuing the knowledge expansion through the systematic approach where they don’t entirely rely exclusively on the craft traditions transmissions from one gen to the next generation. Professional in computing always tend have clients but not customers. The understanding is that a computing professional aims at meeting the client’s needs which are consistent with the requirement of the client unlike in sales where we try satisfying the customer’s desires. In computing the professionals –employees and that of public relationships is expressed using some codes of ethics which will be reviewed later in this study. Nevertheless, whether the professionals meets their profession criteria when compared to other professions they may be deficient in other ways which are significant. In USA Texas an association for computing professionals was formed for licensing individuals known as Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) (Simons, 2002). Many proprietary certifications have been offered by ICT leading companies in the World like Microsoft, VMware, Cisco, IBM, HP, and Novell among others. Nonetheless, even if the computing professions are always strongly differentiated, the computing professionals have other ethical compulsions like it is explained from the following concepts in the literature review.
When it comes to professional especially in the computing world then we might ask ourselves so many questions in all manners. This has led to us asking ourselves the following questions that we can be able we can be able to do a comprehensive research in ethics and professionalism in computing.
Introduction
What is moral responsibility in the computing world? Many questions have been asked on how the ethics in computing profession has developed, how they are currently, the ethical issues and last is the gap that will need to be addressed in future. Four decades ago the atomic energy of Canada limited (AECL) which was known for manufacturing and selling cancer radiations treatment which were known as Therac 25 which relied entirely on the computer software in controlling its operations. In 1985 the Therac 25 caused the deaths of about 3 patients and seriously injuring other three patients to point it was hard for them to recover immediately (N. G. Leveson and C. S. Turner, 1993). We might ask ourselves so many questions to who was to blame: was it the operator administering the treatment? Was it the developer who tested the control software’s? Was it the system engineer who forgot something? Was it the manufacturer (AECL)? Was it the government agencies (Ladd, 1982)? The scenario here can be used in analysing the different kinds of responsibility (H. Nissenbaum, 1994).
Responsibilities is attributed to the causes. If we consider the case of the tornado we may say that it was responsible in for the house damage. In the scenario of Therac 25 treatment we may say that the operator was the cause of the deaths for starting the radiations but we cannot blame him/her just like we cannot blame the weather for failing morally.
The person who is assigned a task or a job or a function is the one who becomes responsible for that specific role. In the Therac-25 case or scenario we consider the software developer to be responsible for designing the software while the system engineer is designing of the hardware machine.
An organization or an individual will liable and legally responsible for the occurrence of such problems that violates the stated law. In this, one can be charged for committing a crime or a company be sued and charged for violating laws. In consideration of the Therac-25 scenario the AECL could have been sued.
The causal and legal responsibilities always tend to be so exclusive where in one case if one is responsible then the other is not responsible. This kind of responsibility is so shared in the manner that the professionals are always responsible for the products safety they are designing. Moral responsibility is unique in that one can hold both the acting and failing to act. A scenario case is where a hardware engineer notices there is flaw in the design and could lead to damage or shock in the topology. Even if that is not his task the engineer of the hardware is responsible for notifying the person responsible by communicating about the issue of the design flaw and in case something happens and he never addressed the issue then the hardware engineer may be held accountable for failing to act. The computing in systems often vague accountability (H. Nissenbaum, 1994).
Ethics in computing world has been addressed as an area that is growing very rapidly as the technology grows. The term computer ethic can well describes such growth and development. The history of ethics in professional computing can be understood to where professional or philosophers are known for applying the traditional theories in ethics such as the utilitarianism, Kantianism, the virtue ethics and the contract theory that are with regard the technology of computer as they are widely used. In construing the ethics in professional of computing it may involve several things such as the standards of professional practice, codes of conduct, computer law aspects, public policy, ethics in corporation and the sociology and psychology in computing.
The ethical issues in computing was addressed in the 1960s where Donn parker examined the unethical and the illegal use of PCs by the professionals of computers. The claim by parker was that the computer users left their ethics outside when entering the working premises. In the 1970s Walter maner show the ethics in computers to be a field in computing that deal with inquiries dealing with problems know to have aggravated ethically and that could be transform or that they were created by the use of technology. In amid 1980s there are great number of social and ethical consequences of IT as the issues like the computer enabled crimes and disasters are mostly caused by the failures in computers, privacy invasion in computers Dbs. and suits that regards the ownership of the software.
Responsibilities to clients and Users
It does not matter the department you are in computing professions but one must perform the assigned task in a competent way and according to the set standards of the specific profession. When the computing professions are assessing the PC systems capabilities and risks then they must be candid. This means that they must report all relevant info they find in a honest and accurate way. When professionals are designing the computer system the professional should not only consider the needs of the client or user but should consider how the device will entirely affect the quality of life of the users. Another responsibility of a computing profession is identifying the potential biases in the selected design (Nissenbaum, 1996).A good profession does not force the clients in buying the software but they must give them time to understand it and hence make a decision on whether to buy or not (C. Kaner, 2015).
Many computing professionals work for the employers. The relationship with their employers is contractual. They work for their employers and in return they get a salary. The particulars should be aware of the conflicts of interest which he or she owes to other parties besides the employer.
Professionals deserves respect an in return they should show the same to the people they interact with which demonstrates a kind of respect known as “collegiality”. When a professional uses the idea of the second profession the second profession should second him and support him. As the computing professionals work together hence they must observe some of the professional standards.
According to engineering codes of ethics some of the most important factors to be considered includes things like the safety, the health and the welfare of the entire public. A parts of this should be enhancing the public understanding in computing.
The changing nature of technology being constant has made it difficult in assigning the moral codes that are specifics, however it is necessary to consider ethics in making decisions in the area of computing’s. Computing has been known for creating a set of ethical problems which are unique to itself (Mary, 1990). Some of the ethical issues experienced are such as the use of hardware of which one is not authorized (De George, 1995). Disputing the rights of the products, the use of computers in committing frauds, hacking and theft of info and data, sabotaging of information using viruses etc. All the above discussed issues can be summarized to four ethical issues in computing namely computer crime, responsibility of the PCs failures, computer property protections and privacy of the data.
This type of crime is intellectual. The individual who are committing are very intelligent in that they manipulate the computer system in way they have access to the info in it (Mills, 1982). An example that shows it is unethical is stealing funds via PC.
This is any computer related activity which is done without the owner consent and approval over the network. This activity has been known for posing very serious dilemmas to who is the owner of the info and then who should have access to it.
This focuses on the functions that are basic and that’s is from the capability of storage, organization and exchange of records (Forester, 1990). One information should be stored in a place where one is guaranteed his or her privacy making it safe and secure in all manners (Johnson, 1985).
The main aim of this research is to try to alleviate the struggle many are going through that makes them vulnerable people. The knowledge gap between the issues of ethics can be explained and addressed in the areas where our aim is to address the ethical issues of professional in computing that will go hand in hand with the development of ethics in computing such as the privacy, accuracy, property, accessibility and the effects of the quality of life of the systems.
The main gap to be put in our minds is the human experiment in which we the individuals have to give out all they can in trying to close the gap that is created and bridged by the issues in ethics and as computing professionals we should set a good example in becoming the best
The main reason for this review of the methodology applied. The approach includes the qualitative studies systematic reviews posing the methodological challenges. The idea here is coming up with an idea of how we came up with the details and the discussing all the details of how the issues of ethics affect professionalism in computing (CQMG, 2007). The paper has presented several examples illustrating the two approaches of synthesising data and that is the textual narrative and thematic that is used in relating in a single review that aims at enabling the researchers in considering the strength of all the different approaches. The research is aimed at contributing to the development of the synthesis of both qualitative and quantitative data (Harden, 2006).
The review is laying view about the issues addressed to be affecting the ethics in professionals in computing. The research will include both the quantitative and qualitative studies (Attree P, 2006). The methods studied will and findings are analysed somewhere and reports in a more emphasis (Dixon-Woods M, 2004). There were many methods that I used in analysing the review and some of them were as indicated below. I did sampling in a given company and randomly choose 10 people working in the computing profession and the following were deducted (RS, 2001). There are so many ways in which data can be collected and gathered may it from primary sources or secondary sources. The following are some of the techniques that were applied in data collection.
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Questionnaire Name—————————- Field———————- Department——————– Dealing—————— |
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Fill all the questions in the given questionnaire 1. Are you satisfied working as a computing profession? 2. What are some of ethical issues in computing profession? 3. How does this issues affect the professions in computing? 4. What are some of gaps that need to be acknowledged so that we improves professionalism in computing? 5. What are some of the responsibilities that you need to portray when at work and off work? |
A questionnaire was done to all of them and the results collected and used for analysing of the information about the research.
The other area was an interview was performed which was structured and very closed in a manner that it allowed the duration for all to be the same and took less time. Same questions as those of the questionnaire were asked in all ways and the participants answered them in a polite way and the helped in giving the results.
Other members were not available and the only way was use of online surveys through the websites where they answered the questions in way that was satisfying.
The other techniques that was used in data collection was the skype where we used video conferencing to get the information from all parties involved.
The use of case study like that of the Theruc-25 treatment where they were asked some questions to determining who was to be blamed for the deaths and injuries? This makes them to think critically and hence making them to be involved in the data collection.
Thematic Synthesis
The conclusion in thematic synthesis is drawn from all the common elements across the assorted studies. This type of analysis method is accessible more in the reader’s eyes than in the case of the textual synthesis (Dixon-Woods M, 2006). The conclusions from thematic synthesis is that fulfilled a very important research that aims at generating the hypotheses of the qualitative research an area that was reviewed poorly in the past.
In the approach of textual narrative synthesis the group studies are more homogeneous. This techniques has been widely used in synthesising the different research type’s evidence such as the qualitative, quantitative and economic (Hopkins DP, 2001). In this review the textual synthesis has proven to be very useful in many ways such that it describes the difference of the studies included making it to explicitly diversify in the study designs and the contexts.
The chosen methodology is the qualitative and quantitative methods in which the suitable techniques that would be suggested and proposed for this study is the questionnaires and which could administered online or face to face.
The reason behind selecting questionnaire is because they can be supported by online and offline and the information is reliable and it is easy to retrieve the raw facts in case they are lost.
Conclusion
This research is based on the ethical issues that are addressed in computing professionalism. The areas that has been widely discussed are the literature review clearly indicating the background, the ethical issues affecting professionalism in the computing field and the acknowledgements of such gaps that need to be addressed. The other areas that have been discussed in detail is the methodology review clearly indicating the methods used and the proposed technique for data collection being the use of questionnaire.
References
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Conaway, C., 2017. The Knowledge Gap of Research Ethics. Vulnerable populations should be protected through research rather than from research., 12(17), pp. 12-17.
CQMG, 2007. Qualitative Methods Group., Cochrane : s.n.
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Harden, 2006. Moving beyond effectiveness in evidence synthesis. London, National Institute for Health & Clinical. Extending the boundaries of systematic reviews to integrate different types of study: examples of methods developed within reviews of young people’s health., 5(4), p. 15–30..
Hopkins DP, B. P. R. C. H. C. C.-K. V. F. J. M. J. S. D. H. J. W. T. H. K., 2001. American Journal of Preventive Medicine.. Reviews of evidence regarding interventions to reduce tobacco use and exposure to environmental tobacco smoke., 13(4), p. 16–66.
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