(Part 8 of the University of Hertfordshire Tech Ethics Course. << Part 7 | Part 9 >>)
Let’s continue our brief look at some of the arguments around contentious areas in tech. In this post, we'll consider open data and code, social scoring, and accessibility.
Open Code
When code is released by the copyright holder under a license that means it can be looked at, updated, or tried by anyone, we call that Open Source Software (OSS) or Free Software. Some licenses impose restrictions on the code's actual use (e.g. copyleft licenses) but some don't (permissive licenses).However, recently the seemingly unimpeachable concept of open code has been ethically challenged:
- Several OSS communities have complained their software is being used by commercial businesses in a way that negatively impacts them. The subject of the accusation is often AWS, and the claim is that AWS takes OSS projects and changes them, drawing users away from the original community. AWS counter-argues they couldn’t use the code commercially without changing it, and they contribute back to the codebase. There are strong arguments (and feelings) on both sides.
- In another ethical OSS debate, some project contributors are getting angry that the code they write for free is being used by organisations they disagree with (for example, ICE). This is a particularly difficult argument. How do you feel about personal responsibility? Does it lie with the creator of a product, or the user? Should you impose your own ethical standards on your code's users?
The takeaway for engineers working on open source projects is to read the license your code will be released under and think about it. Some licenses mean anyone can use what you produce and you might have little say about it. How you feel about that might depend whether you reckon the creator is responsible for their code's use or the user. That is something philosophers are still arguing over.
Open Data
The concept of Open Data is similar to that of open code. Open Data enthusiasts believe data should be available to all without copyrights or patents getting in the way of use. The idea is that if data is freely available, more scientific and social progress will be made and that will help everyone.When we’re discussing government data, opening it is fairly uncontroversial. When the data was gathered by private companies, things get more difficult. They argue the data they record is a valuable commercial asset and should only be available to them. One counter-argument might be that the public should, by rights, have access to data gathered in public (e.g. a camera on a public street). Another is that, as a private individual, you should have access to data gathered from you (e.g. recordings made of your heartbeat by a medical device).
Further complicating matters is another argument made against releasing data, which is that it might contain information individuals want to keep private.
Again, there are arguments to be made on either side. For me personally, the value of open data outweighs the reasons against it.
Keeping Score
Social scores are ratings based on group feedback, like thumbs ups on Facebook or likes on Twitter. Commercial sites allow you to rate everyone from tradesmen to AirBnB guests. Social scoring is generally well-liked by society - although there are always some concerns over fake reviews, which aim to distort the scores, and make them less valid or useful.More controversial, however, are scoring applications that are either devised by or heavily linked to governments, and may use surveillance data rather than voluntary ratings. The most advanced of these apps make up China's social credit system: a form of scoring that affects citizen’s lives in a variety of ways: from public shaming of jaywalkers to whether you can use public transport.
There isn't one single social credit score in China. There are a whole range: some are generated by businesses, some by state government, and most are tied to the government in some way. According to Samantha Hoffman, fellow at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, the basis of credit scores varies by region. "It's according to which place you're in, because they have their own catalogs," she says. “[Bad behaviour] can range from not paying fines when you're deemed fully able to, misbehaving on a train, standing up a taxi, or driving through a red light.”
In one example, residents of the Chinese city of Rongcheng start with 1,000 civic points and the authorities can deduct them for antisocial activity, while points are added for social goods like donating to charity.
In the West, the idea that your government is constantly watching you and might even publicly shame you or stop you taking the train seems dystopian. Many Hong Kong residents feel that way too and fear of Chinese government surveillance may have played a part in 2019’s riots. However, in mainland China the social credit system is reasonably popular and it has certainly helped them in their response to the coronavirus outbreak.
Accessibility
As a techie, it is generally accepted that the right thing to do when writing a product is to make it accessible to users who have poor eyesight, hearing, dexterity or any other challenge. As we covered in part 2 (“The Law’s the Floor”) this is a legal requirement for some software, but not all.Until a few years ago, accessibility was uncontroversial and the W3C HTML standards ensured that, by default, most well-engineered websites could be read by accessibility tools like screenreaders. However, things have changed. HTML is well defined and therefore accessible, but some CSS frameworks are not, That makes it very easy to write modern websites that look great but are unusable by a lot of users.
The takeaway for engineers is to consider website accessibility when choosing a UI framework.
What next?
In this article we have looked at the ethics of open data and code, social scoring, and accessibility. Most have arguments on both sides - very few ethical debates are black and white. The important thing is to carefully consider both sides and make your own judgment on what you think is right - it might not be your instant reaction.(Part 8 of the University of Hertfordshire Tech Ethics Course. << Part 7 | Part 9 >>)
Image by https://unsplash.com/@shivelycreative
