Ethical issues and the use of Personally Identifiable Information in computer systems, applications, and the internet

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In today’s era of technology, many people are concerned about internet privacy. Most concerns are usually sparked by misinformation. One piece of technology that is most misunderstood is the cookie and its uses.

Time Newspaper has learnt that it's not surprising that Internet companies have electronic dossiers that contain personal information for individuals who subscribe to the websites. Generally, these companies have obtained the information from people based on individual's visit to the website, sent and received emails, tagged photos, and searches people carry out. However, the extent of personal information known by these Internet companies has remained largely unknown as well who they provide and/or sell this information to. However, Internet companies continue to gather lots of personal information from different people who focus on carrying out online activities on a daily basis. Currently, it's estimated that these firms gather personal information from nearly 500 million users but are hesitant to provide this information to the other firms or individuals. As their unwillingness to share has attracted significant congressional inquiry, things could finally change in California following the introduction of a bill that may force companies to disclose the kind of personal information they have gathered and how this information is being used.

This privacy policy has been compiled to better serve those who are concerned with how their 'Personally identifiable information ' (PII) is being used online. PII, as used in US privacy law and information security, is information that can be used on its own or with other information to identify, contact, or locate a single person, or to identify an individual in context. Please read our privacy policy carefully to get a clear understanding of how we collect, use, protect or otherwise handle your Personally Identifiable Information in accordance with our website.

According to McCallister, Grance, and Scarfone “Individual harms may include identity theft, embarrassment, or blackmail. Organizational harms may include a loss of public trust, legal liability, or remediation costs” (McCallister, Grance, & Scarfone, 2010) The National Initiative for Cybersecurity Careers and Studies (NICCS) defines PII as “the information that permits the identity of an individual to be directly or indirectly inferred” (NICCS, 2015). PII include name, personal identification number, address information, and last but not least personal characteristics. Federal agency use of personal information is governed primarily by the Privacy Act of 1974 and the E-Government Act of 2002. The Privacy Act of 1974 purpose is to control the collection, use, and disclosure of personally identifiable information in a system of records that are retained by a federal agency. (United States Government Accountability Office , 2008) The E-Government Act 2002 ((PL 107-347) includes a privacy provision, section 208, which “purpose is to ensure sufficient protections for the privacy of personal information as agencies implement citizen-centered electronic Government” (E-Government Act

This past week’s course work was focused on privacy as it relates to ethics in information technology, privacy protection and key privacy issues. We have learned from our text, research and discussion board collaborations that an individual’s privacy is not fully protected from a legal perspective, that government and businesses must protect how data is saved and who is allowed to access educational, medical, or any personally identifiable information (PII) that can contribute to privacy and anonymity issues. That as an individual, we must take action in securing and protecting our PII to prevent malicious acts such as identity theft.

Internet privacy, a subset to computer privacy, involves the mandate of personal privacy concerning the storing, repurposing, provision to third parties, and displaying of information relating to oneself via Internet. The controversy of privacy concern has being articulated form the beginnings of large scale computer sharing. According to Maureen Dorney in her article, “Privacy and the Internet” she states that in 1993 there were already 83% of Americans that were concerned with threats to personal privacy. In fact, this was not the only year in which data was collected. She adds that in 1970 there were an increasing number of populations being threat of privacy violations. Since then, the controversy prompted several members of congress to call for increased privacy protection for data

A Privacy Impact Assessment (PIA) is used to identify how PII is stored, shared, collected, protected, and managed. This

Over the past decade the world has gotten much smaller due to the electronic communication the Internet has fostered. While this promotes business and international relations, problems arise regarding the protection of individuals’ personal information. Many countries around the world have developed privacy policies and laws protect an individual's information in the realm of electronic communication. Universal enforcement gets complicated because the Internet is not restricted to one country; it’s worldwide. As a result, concerns arise regarding the compatibility of various countries' privacy policies. This paper will discuss the current legislation in place for various major

The reasons for this are varied. One of the major factors that prevent full federal protection is that states have broad ways of defining what is considered personally identifiable information. For instance, take a state like Connecticut: their state laws consider an “account number” as a personal identifier (Wright, 2009). Let’s say a church sponsored a bake sale and someone bought a cupcake from that church. If the church happened to log that sale with a unique number, say, S101, where ‘S” is the first initial of the buyer and the number is a one-up sales number, that church would then fall under the provisions of the Connecticut state law and may be required to protect that customer’s identity. Other states have varying definitions as to what PII is. The most robust PII protections in the country exist in the state of California, making PII a protected right and allowing anyone that interacts with that data to appropriately protect and reasonably notify affected people of any potential security breaches (Wikipedia, n.d.).

The concern about privacy on the Internet is increasingly becoming an issue of international dispute. ?Citizens are becoming concerned that the most intimate details of their daily lives are being monitored, searched and recorded.? (www.britannica.com) 81% of Net users are concerned about threats to their privacy while online. The greatest threat to privacy comes from the construction of e-commerce alone, and not from state agents. E-commerce is structured on the copy and trade of intimate personal information and therefore, a threat to privacy on the Internet.

Information gathering, through networking, social media, and both on and offline storage have made it easier to collect information about an individual than ever before, with many concerns having arisen over the years about privacy and the ability to protect that privacy. As debates over personally identifiable information continue, one cornerstone remains a constant, ethics. Ethics are defined as “the standard by which human actions can be judged right and wrong (Online, 2012)”, but even that can be debated when discussed within the realm of information technology. Have you ever been to an internet shopping site and “trusted” the secure connection? Essentially, you are entrusting an inanimate system developed by an individual or group

Personal data is quickly becoming a commodity in today's high technology world. This information is used by banks, investment and brokerage companies, credit card merchants, government agencies (local, state and federal), and consumer product-based companies. Most people probably don't realize the amount of information that's shared between companies, or how often it's done. Many companies sell and share customer data to help sell products and find out what new products they should produce. Other uses include gathering information about inventory levels to help better determine what types of products are bought at which store, when and how often. This can be used for inventory and production, to make sure that the store (or

Personal information can consist of anything from a home address, telephone number, social security number, income, credit card history, etc, any piece of information that can be tied to a distinct individual. Once personal

Privacy concerns on the web have become an undesirable consequence that people face with cyber technology. The ability of computers to gather and store unlimited amount of information from the internet raises privacy issues concerning an individual’s informational privacy. A person’s right to informational privacy is the ability to control the flow of their personal information, including the transfer and exchange of that information. An invasion of informational privacy denies people the right to control who accesses their personal information. Many internet users are unaware that they are more likely to compromise their privacy when using the internet services such as search engines and social networking sites. The internet provides access to an incredible amount of information from all over the world. Some internet users use the internet exclusively as a source of information while other internet users use the internet to create and disseminate information for others to use. However, the vast amount of information floating on the internet would not