Full Answer Section

• Fostering Trust and Responsibility: Codes highlight the responsibilities professionals have towards their clients, colleagues, the public, and the profession itself. They guide professionals to act in ways that uphold the trust placed in them by society, such as prioritizing the client’s best interests or maintaining professional competence.
• Encouraging Ethical Reflection: Beyond mere rules, codes often promote a spirit of ethical deliberation. They encourage professionals to critically reflect on the moral implications of their decisions and actions, fostering a deeper understanding of their ethical duties.

Two ways professional codes of ethics benefit a profession:

1. Enhancing Public Trust and Credibility: A well-defined and enforced code of ethics signals to the public that the profession is committed to high standards of conduct and places the welfare of those it serves above self-interest. This builds confidence and respect for the profession, making it more credible and trustworthy in the eyes of society. For example, the legal profession’s code emphasizes justice and client advocacy, which helps maintain public faith in the legal system.
2. Establishing Professional Identity and Self-Regulation: Codes help to define what a profession stands for and differentiates it from other fields. They signify that the profession is mature enough to govern its own members and hold them to a standard of conduct, rather than relying solely on external regulation. This ability to self-regulate is a hallmark of a true profession and can prevent excessive government oversight. It also provides a shared moral compass that unites members of the profession.

B. Select two principles from the “ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct” and explain how they are important in your current or future profession (System Administrator).

I will select the following two principles from the ACM Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct:

• 1.2 Avoid harm.
• 2.5 Access computing and communication resources only when authorized or when compelled by the public good.

Let’s discuss their importance to a System Administrator:

1. 1.2 Avoid harm.

   This principle is paramount for a System Administrator. Our core responsibility is to ensure the stable, secure, and reliable operation of computing systems. Harm can manifest in many forms:

   • Data Loss or Corruption: A system administrator directly manages data storage, backups, and recovery. Negligence or malicious intent can lead to irreversible data loss for individuals or entire organizations, causing severe financial, reputational, and operational harm. For example, failing to properly configure backup routines or accidentally deleting critical files directly violates this principle.
   • System Downtime: Unplanned outages of critical systems (e.g., hospital patient records, financial trading platforms, emergency services dispatch systems) can cause significant harm. A system administrator’s actions (or inactions) directly impact uptime. For instance, an improperly executed system update that brings down a production server for an extended period could cause massive financial losses for a company and disrupt critical services for users.
   • Security Breaches: System administrators are on the front line of cybersecurity. A failure to patch vulnerabilities, enforce strong access controls, or respond effectively to threats can lead to data breaches, compromising sensitive personal or corporate information, resulting in financial fraud, identity theft, or reputational damage. My role directly involves implementing firewalls, intrusion detection systems, and access policies to prevent such harm.
   • Misconfiguration: Even seemingly minor misconfigurations can have widespread harmful effects, from exposing internal systems to the internet to allowing unauthorized access to sensitive information. As a system administrator, meticulous attention to detail and rigorous testing of configurations are essential to avoid unintended harm.

   For a System Administrator, “Avoid harm” means proactive security measures, diligent maintenance, careful change management, and rapid incident response to minimize negative impacts on users, data, and organizational operations.

2. 2.5 Access computing and communication resources only when authorized or when compelled by the public good.

   This principle is fundamental to the trust and integrity of a System Administrator’s role. System administrators inherently possess elevated access privileges to virtually all systems, data, and network resources within an organization. This power comes with immense responsibility.

   • Maintaining Trust and Integrity: This principle directly addresses the ethical dilemma of having extraordinary access. It dictates that such access must only be used for legitimate, authorized purposes related to one’s job duties (e.g., system maintenance, troubleshooting, security audits). Unauthorized snooping into employee emails, accessing private customer data out of curiosity, or using company resources for personal gain are clear violations.
   • Protecting Privacy: As administrators, we handle vast amounts of sensitive and private information. Adhering to this principle ensures that personal data is only accessed when absolutely necessary for the functioning of the system or legal compliance, and never for personal interest or gossip. This builds and maintains user and organizational trust.
   • Security Compliance: Unauthorized access, even by an administrator, can create security vulnerabilities or audit trail issues. By strictly adhering to authorized access, we uphold security policies and regulatory compliance (e.g., GDPR, HIPAA).
   • Ethical Boundaries: The “compelled by the public good” clause offers a narrow exception, typically in emergency situations where a system failure threatens human life or critical infrastructure, and no direct authorization can be obtained quickly. This implies an extreme, life-or-death scenario where bypassing normal authorization is a last resort to prevent greater harm, and even then, requires careful documentation and justification post-facto. It explicitly does not grant permission for general “good intentions” to override authorization.

   For a System Administrator, upholding this principle means constantly being mindful of their privileged access, implementing robust access controls, and using their power ethically and responsibly, ensuring that systems serve their intended purpose without compromising privacy or security.

C. Explain the impact of bias in technology.

1. Describe two negative impacts of artificial intelligence (AI) bias or AI misinformation.

   a. Discriminatory Outcomes and Perpetuation of Societal Inequities (AI Bias): AI bias, often stemming from biased training data or flawed algorithms, can lead to unfair, unjust, or discriminatory outcomes. A primary negative impact is the perpetuation and amplification of existing societal inequities. For example, an AI hiring system trained predominantly on data from successful white male employees might inadvertently develop a bias against resumes from women or minority groups, even if equally qualified. This can lead to qualified candidates being overlooked simply due to their gender, race, or, as in the scenario, disability. This not only directly harms individuals by denying them opportunities (e.g., jobs, loans, medical care) but also entrenches systemic discrimination, making it harder for marginalized groups to achieve upward mobility and exacerbating social divides.

   b. Erosion of Trust and Undermining of Critical Institutions (AI Misinformation): AI misinformation, often generated by advanced generative AI models (e.g., deepfakes, sophisticated disinformation campaigns), can have a severe negative impact by eroding public trust in information sources, media, and even democratic processes. For instance, AI-generated fake news articles or manipulated audio/video (deepfakes) can be deployed to spread false narratives about public health, political candidates, or social issues. The negative impact is that individuals may become unable to discern truth from falsehood, leading to widespread confusion, polarization, and a decreased ability to make informed decisions. This undermines the credibility of traditional media, scientific consensus, and democratic institutions, potentially leading to social unrest, health crises (e.g., vaccine hesitancy), or political instability.

2. Explain how the Association for Computing Machinery’s (ACM’s) code of ethics can help address one of the negative impacts from part C1.

   Let’s address the negative impact of discriminatory outcomes and perpetuation of societal inequities (AI Bias) using the ACM Code of Ethics.

   Several principles within the ACM Code of Ethics can collectively address this impact, but Principle 1.2 “Avoid harm” is particularly crucial.

   • How 1.2 “Avoid harm” addresses AI Bias: The principle “Avoid harm” directly mandates that computing professionals, including those developing or deploying AI systems, must take action to prevent or minimize negative consequences. When designing or implementing an AI hiring system, a computing professional adhering to this principle would recognize that unintended bias leading to discrimination constitutes significant harm to individuals and society. Therefore, their ethical obligation would be to:
     • Proactively Identify and Mitigate Bias: This means critically examining training data for historical biases, using fairness metrics to test the AI’s performance across different demographic groups, and implementing debiasing techniques in the algorithms.
     • Anticipate Potential Harm: Before deployment, perform thorough impact assessments to foresee how the AI might disproportionately affect certain populations (e.g., candidates with disabilities, minorities) and develop strategies to prevent such outcomes.
     • Establish Safeguards and Oversight: Implement human-in-the-loop mechanisms, audit trails, and review processes to catch and correct discriminatory decisions made by the AI, as the scenario describes is currently lacking.
     • Prioritize Human Well-being: The ultimate goal of AI should be to serve humanity positively. If an AI system causes harm through discrimination, its design and deployment are unethical under this principle, necessitating immediate correction and a re-evaluation of its purpose and method.

   By internalizing and applying 1.2 “Avoid harm,” computing professionals are ethically bound not just to build efficient systems, but to build just systems that do not unfairly disadvantage any group. This goes beyond mere technical functionality to encompass a responsibility for the societal impact of their creations, directly addressing the core problem of AI bias leading to discriminatory outcomes.

D. Acknowledge sources, using in-text citations and references, for content that is quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.

In-text citations:

• “Professional codes of ethics provide a framework for ethical decision-making and accountability within a given field” (Johnson, 2021, p. 15).
• The ACM Code of Ethics states, “Avoid harm” (ACM, 2018, Principle 1.2).
• The principle of “Access computing and communication resources only when authorized or when compelled by the public good” (ACM, 2018, Principle 2.5) highlights the ethical boundaries of system administrators.
• Algorithmic bias can lead to the “reinforcement of historical discrimination” (O’Neil, 2016, p. 12).
• The proliferation of AI-generated misinformation poses a threat to public trust and the integrity of information (Chen & Lee, 2023).