Professional Practices

for
Information Technology

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MUZAFFAR IQBAL
• PhD in Progress (International Islamic University Islamabad)
• MS Software Engineering (London-UK)
• MSc Computer Science (Pakistan)
• Assistant Professor in COMSATS (2013-todate)
• Assistant Professor in FUUAST (2006-2013)
• Deputy Director in ICMAP (1997-2004)

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Plagiarism
• What is it?
• Positive reasons for not plagiarizing
• Copying from single/multiple sources
• Paraphrasing, collusion
• How to avoid it?
• Reference list VS bibliography
• Plagiarism detection
• Penalty

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Ethics in Information Technology,
Fourth Edition

George W. Reynolds

Chapter 1
An Overview of Ethics
Objectives
• As you read this chapter, consider the following questions:
• What is ethics, and why is it important to act according to a
code of ethics?
• Why is business ethics becoming increasingly important?
• What are organizations doing to improve their business ethics?

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
• Why are organizations interested in adopting good business
ethics?
• What approach can you take to ensure ethical decision making?
• What trends have increased the risk of using information
technology in an unethical manner?

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What is Ethics?
• Each society forms a set of rules by which a society lives.
• A set of rules establishes the boundaries of generally accepted
behavior.
• Unfortunately, the different rules often have contradictions, and

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
people are sometimes uncertain about which rule to follow.
• Example, Cheating in exams

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What is Ethics…
• Morality
• Social conventions about right and wrong
• Form basis for an established consensus
• Morality may vary by:

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
• Age
• Cultural group or Ethnic background
• Religion
• Life experiences
• Education
• Gender

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• There is widespread agreement on the immorality of murder,
theft, and ransom.
• But other behaviors that are accepted in one culture might be
unacceptable in another.

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
• Even within the same society, people can have strong
disagreements over important moral issues.
• For example, issues such as the death penalty and gun control
are continuously debated, and both sides feel that their
arguments are on solid moral ground.

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Definition of Ethics
• Ethics is a set of beliefs about right and wrong behavior within a
society.
• Many of which are almost universal. E.g. nearly everyone would agree
that lying and cheating are unethical.
• Opinions about what constitutes ethical behavior often vary

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
dramatically. For example, attitudes toward software piracy.
• People also develop habits that make it easier to choose between what
society considers good or bad.
• Virtues are habits that incline people to do what is acceptable. E.g.
Fairness, kindness, and loyalty
• Vices are habits of unacceptable behavior. E. g. egotism, greed,
jealousy, and anger
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The Importance of Integrity
• Your moral principles/ statements of what you believe to be right
may vary.
• As a child, you may have been taught not to lie, cheat, or steal.
• As an adult facing more complex decisions, you often reflect on

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
your principles when you consider what to do in different
situations like,
• Is it okay to lie to protect someone’s feelings?
• Is it acceptable to exaggerate your work experience on a résumé?
• Can you cut corners on a project to meet a tight deadline?

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The Importance of Integrity…
• People with integrity:
• Act in accordance with a personal code of principles
• Extend to all the same respect and consideration
• Apply the same moral standards in all situations
• Unfortunately, consistency can be difficult to achieve

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
• In this situation, you may be forced to compromise one of your
principles and act.
• Lack of integrity emerges if you apply moral standards differently
according to situation or people involved
• Many ethical dilemmas are not as simple as right versus wrong, for
example selling a company product having some hidden issues, or
telling a little white lie to spare a friend some pain or
embarrassment 13
The Difference Between Morals,
Ethics, and Laws
• Morals: one’s personal beliefs about right and wrong
• Ethics: standards or codes of behavior expected of an
individual by a group (nation, organization, profession)
• Example: the ethics of the law profession demand that defense
attorneys defend an accused client to the best of their ability,

Ethics in Information
Technology, Fourth Edition
even if they know that the client is guilty)
• Law: system of rules that tells us what we can and cannot do
• Laws are enforced by a set of institutions
• Legal acts conform to the law
• Laws can proclaim an act as legal, although many people may
consider the act immoral
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Ethics in the Business World
• Ethics has risen to the top of the business agenda because the
risks associated with inappropriate behavior have increased.
• In the past decade, we have seen the failure of major
corporations due to unethical behavior including Enron, NokiaMI1
and WorldCom.
• We have also witnessed numerous corporate officers and
senior managers sentenced to prison due to their unethical
behavior.
• We have watched the collapse of several financial institutions
due to unwise and unethical decision making.

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Slide 15

MI1 https://medium.com/multiplier-magazine/why-did-nokia-fail-81110d981787
Muzaffar Iqbal, 30/09/2020
Ethics in the Business World…
• Several trends have increased the likelihood of unethical
behavior.
• First, for many organizations, greater globalization has created
a much more complex work environment that spans diverse
cultures and societies, making it much more difficult to apply
principles and codes of ethics consistently.
• Second, in today’s recessionary economic climate,
organizations are extremely challenged to maintain revenue
and profits. Some organizations are greatly tempted to resort
to unethical behavior to maintain profits.

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Ethics in the Business World…
• Employees, shareholders, and organizations are increasingly…
• violating accounting standards
• violating required health and safety practices
• producing unsafe or substandard products
• Examples can be seen in the book

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Why Fostering Good Business
Ethics Is Important
• Organizations have at least five good reasons for promoting a
work environment in which employees are encouraged to act
ethically when making business decisions:
1. Gaining the good will of the community:
• Although organizations exist primarily to earn profits or
provide services to customers, they also have some
fundamental responsibilities to society.
• Often they declare these responsibilities in a formal statement
of their company’s principles or beliefs.

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COMSATS Socially Responsible
Activities
• Scholarships for needy students
• Scholarships for faculty members
• Housing schemes for faculty members
• Seminars for research and developments
• Pak-China forum

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2. Creating an organization that operates consistently
• Consistency ensures that employees know what is expected of
them.
• Consistency also means that shareholders, customers,
suppliers, and community know what they can expect of the
organization.
• Although each company’s value system is different, but many
companies share the following values:
• Operate with honesty and integrity, staying true to organizational
principles
• Operate according to standards of ethical conduct, in words and
action
• Treat colleagues, customers, and consumers with respect
• Strive to be the best at what matters to the company
• Make decisions based on facts and principles
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 3. Fostering good business practices
• Good ethics means good business/improved profits
• Companies that:
• Produce safe and effective products
• Avoid costly recalls and lawsuits
• Provide excellent service that retains customers instead of losing
them to competitors
• Develop and maintain strong employee relations
• Suffer lower turnover rates
• Enjoy better employee morale
• Suppliers/business partners place priority on working with
companies that operate in a fair and ethical manner
• Bad ethics means bad business/waning profits
• Bad ethics can lead to bad business results
• Bad ethics can have a negative impact on employees
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• See examples in the book
4. Protecting the organization and its employees from legal
action
• U.S. Supreme Court established that an employer can be held
responsible for the acts of its employees even if the
employees act in a manner contrary to corporate policy and
their employer’s directions
• This principle is called ‘respondeat superior’ or “let the master
answer.”
• An alliance of several legal organizations argues establishment
of ethics and compliance programs to reduce criminal liability
of organization and making strong efforts to prevent and
detect misconduct in the workplace
• Indeed, in 1991, the Department of Justice established
sentencing guidelines that suggest more lenient treatment for
convicted employees if their companies have ethics programs.
• Fines for criminal violations can be lowered by up to 80
percent if the organization has implemented an ethics 23
management program and cooperates with authorities
5. Avoiding unfavorable publicity
• Public reputation of company strongly influences:
• Value of its stock
• How consumers regard products and services
• Degree of oversight (error/ lapse) received from government
• Amount of support and cooperation received from its business
partners
• Thus organizations are motivated to build strong ethics
programs to avoid negative publicity
• If an organization is perceived as operating ethically then it
will be regarded more favorably by…
• customers,
• business partners,
• shareholders,
• consumer and 24
• financial institutions,
Improving Corporate Ethics
• Characteristics of a successful ethics program
• Employees willing to seek advice about ethical issues
• Employees feel prepared to handle situations that
could lead to misconduct
• Employees are rewarded for ethical behavior
• Employees are not rewarded for success obtained
through questionable means
• Employees feel positive about their company

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Appointing a Corporate Ethics
Officer
• Corporate ethics officer…
• Provides vision and leadership in business conduct
• Should be well-respected, senior-level manager who
reports directly to the CEO
• Ensures ethical procedures are put in place
• Creates and maintains ethics culture
• Is responsible for key knowledge/contact person for ethical
issues
• Unfortunately, simply naming a corporate ethics officer
does not automatically improve an organization’s ethics;
hard work and effort are required to establish and provide
ongoing support for an organizational ethics program
• See book for examples 26
Ethical Standards Set by Board
of Directors
• Board members of company are expected to:
• Conduct themselves according to the highest standards of
personal and professional integrity
• Set standard for company-wide ethical conduct
• Ensure compliance with laws and regulations
• Create environment in which employees can seek advice about
business conduct, raise issues, and report misconduct
• Unfortunately, in a survey conducted in 2007…
• nearly half of all employees saw some form of ethical misconduct
• about 60 percent of those employees reported the misconduct to
management
• one in eight employees did experience some form of retaliation
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(revenge/discouragement)
Establishing a Corporate Code
of Ethics
• Code of ethics
• Highlights an organization’s key ethical issues
• Identifies main values and important principles
• Improves a culture of honesty and accountability within the
organization
• Offers guidance for employees to recognize and deal with ethical
issues
• Provides mechanisms to report unethical conduct
• Help employees abide by the law, follow necessary regulations,
and behave in an ethical manner
• An organization’s code of ethics applies to all including directors,
officers, and other employees.
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• See examples in book
Conducting Social Audits
• Social audit
• Reviews how well organization is meeting ethical and social
responsibility goals
• Communicates new goals for upcoming year
• Shared broadly with employees, shareholders, investors, market
analysts, customers, suppliers, government agencies, and local
communities

• Example on next slide

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Requiring Employees to
Take Ethics Training
• An ancient Greek philosophers believed that personal opinions
about right and wrong behavior could be improved through
education
• Researchers agree that many factors stimulate a person’s moral
development, but one of the most crucial is education
• Thus, an organization’s code of ethics must be promoted and
repeatedly communicated within the organization, from top to
bottom
• Comprehensive ethics education program encourages employees to
act responsibly and ethically
• Often presented in small workshop formats
• Employees apply code of ethics to different case studies (imaginary
and real)
• Demonstration of recent company decisions based on principles from
the code of ethics 31
Requiring Employees to
Take Ethics Training…
• Training increase the percentage of employees who
report incidents of misconduct
• Employees must:
• Learn effective ways of reporting incidents
• Be reassured their feedback will be acted on without
retaliation
• Ethics training makes employees more aware of a
company’s code of ethics and how to apply it.
• It also demonstrates that the company intends to
operate in an ethical manner.
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Including Ethical Criteria in
Employee Appraisals
• Ethical criteria should be included in employees appraisal
• Ethical criteria include:
• Treating others fairly and with respect
• Operating effectively in a multicultural environment
• Accepting personal accountability
• Continually developing themselves and others
• Operating openly and honestly with all

• A recent survey of HR professionals revealed that about 43%

of companies include ethical conduct in employee’s
performance appraisal
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Creating an Ethical Work
Environment
• Most employees want to perform their jobs successfully
and ethically, but good employees may make bad ethical
choices due to:
• aggressive competitors,
• unrealistic budgets,
• unforgiving quotas,
• tight deadlines,
• bonus incentives
• Internal and external constraints etc.
• Employees may also be encouraged to do 34
“whatever it takes” to get the job done
Creating an Ethical Work
Environment…
• Such environments can make some employees feel pressure
to engage in unethical conduct to meet management’s
expectations
• Especially if the organization has no corporate code of ethics
and no strong examples of senior management practicing
ethical behavior.
• Table 1-3 shows how management’s behavior can result in
unethical employee behavior;
• Table 1-4 provides a manager’s checklist for establishing an
ethical workplace

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TABLE 1-3 How management can affect
employees’ ethical behavior

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TABLE 1-3 How management can affect
employees’ ethical behavior

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TABLE 1-3 How management can affect
employees’ ethical behavior

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TABLE 1-3 How management can affect
employees’ ethical behavior

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TABLE 1-3 Possible reasons of employee's
unethical behavior

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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TABLE 1-4 A manager’s checklist for
establishing an ethical work environment

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Including Ethical Considerations in
Decision Making
• Steps in a decision-making process
• Develop problem statement
• Identify alternatives
• Evaluate and choose optimal alternative
• Implement decision
• Evaluate results
• Success

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Develop a Problem Statement
• A problem statement is a clear, concise description of the
issue that needs to be addressed
• A good problem statement answers the following questions:
• What causes people to think there is a problem?
• Who is directly affected by the problem?
• Is there anyone else affected?
• How often does it occur?
• What is the impact of the problem?
• How serious is the problem?
• Development of a problem statement is the most critical step
in the decision-making process.
• If the problem is stated incorrectly, the decision will not solve
the problem. 50
Develop a Problem Statement…
• Example of a good problem statement:
• “Our product supply organization is continually
running out of stock of finished products, creating an
out-of-stock situation on over 15 percent of our
customer orders, resulting in over $300,000 in lost
sales per month.”
• Examples of poor problem statements:
• “We need to implement a new inventory control
system.” (possible solution, not a problem statement)
• “We have a problem with finished product inventory.”
(not specific enough) 51
Identify Alternatives
• Identify several alternative solutions to the problem with the
help of others, including stakeholders.
• Brainstorming with just one other person will reduce your
chances of identifying a broad range of alternatives and
determining the best solution.
• In providing participants information about the problem to be
solved, offer just the facts, without your opinion, so you
don’t influence others to accept your solution.
• During any brainstorming process, try not to be critical of
ideas, as any negative criticism will tend to “shut down” the
group, and the flow of ideas will dry up. Simply write down
the ideas as they are suggested. 52
Evaluate and Choose an Alternative
• The group should evaluate alternatives based on numerous
criteria, such as…
• effectiveness of the solution
• risk associated with each alternative
• cost, and
• time to implement
• feasible
• An alternative that sounds attractive but that is not feasible
will not help to solve the problem.

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Evaluate and Choose an
Alternative…
• As part of the evaluation process, weigh various laws,
guidelines, and principles that may apply.
• You certainly do not want to violate a law that can lead to a
fine or imprisonment for yourself or others.
• Are there any corporate policies or guidelines that apply?
• Does the organizational code of ethics offer guidance?
• Do any of your own personal principles apply?
• Consider the likely consequences of each alternative from
several perspectives
• The alternative selected should…
• Be ethically and legally defensible
• be consistent with the organization’s policies and code of ethics
• provide a good solution to the problem 54
Common Approaches to
Ethical Decision Making

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Virtue Ethics Approach
• Virtues are habits that incline people to do what is
acceptable. E.g. Fairness, kindness, and loyalty
• The virtue ethics approach to decision making focuses on how
you should behave and think about relationships if you are
concerned with your daily life in a community.
• Do whatever is most comfortable doing .
• The assumption is that people are guided by their virtues to
reach the “right” decision.
• Problems
• Does not provide guide for action
• Virtue cannot be worked out objectively; depends on
circumstances
• For example, bravery is a great virtue in many circumstances, but 56
in others it may be foolish
Utilitarian Approach
• Utilitarian approach
• Chooses action that has best overall consequences
• Finds the greatest good by balancing all interests
• Fits concept of value in economics and the use of cost-
benefit analysis
• Problems
• Measuring and comparing values is often difficult
• Predicting resulting benefits and harm is difficult

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Fairness Approach
• Fairness approach
• Focuses on fair distribution of benefits/burdens
• Guiding principle is to treat all people the same
• Problems
• Decisions can be influenced by personal bias
• Others may consider the decision unfair

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Common Good Approach
• Common good approach
• Work together for common set of values and goals
• Implement systems that benefit all people
• Problems
• Consensus is difficult
• Some required to bear greater costs than others

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Implement the Decision
• Implement the decision
• Efficient, effective, timely implementation
• People tend to resist change
• Communication is key for people to accept change
• Transition plan made easy and pain-free

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Evaluate the Results
• Monitor results for desired effect
• Observe impact on organization and stakeholders
• Return to “Develop problem statement” step if further
refinements may be needed

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Ethics in Information Technology…
• Public concern about the ethical use of information
technology includes:
• E-mail and Internet access monitoring
• Many employees might have their e-mail and Internet
access monitored while at work
• Downloading in violation of copyright laws
• Millions of people have downloaded music and movies
at no charge and in apparent violation of copyright laws
at tremendous expense to the owners of those
copyrights.
• Unsolicited e-mail (spam)
• Organizations contact millions of people worldwide
through unsolicited e-mail (spam) as an extremely low-
cost marketing approach. 62
Ethics in Information Technology…
• Hackers and identify theft
• Hackers break into databases of financial and retail
institutions to steal customer information, then use
it to commit identity theft—opening new accounts
and charging purchases to unsuspecting victims.
• Students and plagiarism
• Students around the world have been caught
downloading material from the Web and
plagiarizing content for their term papers and
assignments.
• Cookies and spyware
• Web sites plant cookies or spyware on visitors’ hard
drives to track their online purchases and activities. 63
Ethics in Information Technology…
• What are Cookies?
• A small text file (up to 4KB) created by a website that is stored in
the user's computer either temporarily for that session only or
permanently on the hard disk (persistent
cookie). Cookies provide a way for the website to recognize you
and keep track of your preference
(Source: PC Magazine Encyclopedia)
• For example, users can place items in a shopping cart, switch to
another page or even another site, and when they come back,
the site recognizes them and the current state of the cart.

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Ethics in Information Technology…
• What is Spyware?
• Spyware is software that aims to gather information about a
person or organization without their knowledge, that may send
such information to another entity without the consumer's
consent, or that asserts control over a device without the
consumer's knowledge.
(Source: Wikipedia)
• Spyware is mostly used for the purposes of tracking and storing
Internet users' movements on the Web and serving up pop-up
ads to Internet users.
• Whenever spyware is used for malicious purposes, its presence is
typically hidden from the user and can be difficult to detect.
• Some spyware may be installed by the owner of a shared,
corporate, or public computer intentionally in order to monitor
users. 65
Summary
• Within the same society, people can have strong
disagreements over important moral issues
• Ethics has risen to the top of the business agenda
• Organizations have at least five good reasons for encouraging
employees to act ethically
• To gain the good will of the community
• To create an organization that operates consistently
• To foster good business practices
• To protect the organization and its employees against legal action
• To avoid unfavorable publicity

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Summary…
• Organizations require successful ethics programs
• The corporate ethics officer ensures that ethical procedures
are installed and followed
• Managers’ behaviors and expectations can strongly influence
employees’ ethical behavior
• Most of us have developed a simple decision-making model
that includes five steps
• Ethical considerations must be incorporated into decision
making

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