ABSTRACT
Information technology and information systems built around its artifacts can have powerful effects on individuals, both in their private life and in the workplace. As professionals and users, we should use ethical principles and codes of ethics to avoid and prevent deleterious effects of technology. Infoethics is the application of ethical theories to the development and use of information systems. The principal infoethical issues are privacy, accuracy, property (in particular, intellectual property), and access. These issues have come into a sharp focus as we spend ever more of our time online and as our actions are mediated by systems available over the Internet. Ethical decisions in the information-related domains are made by identifying the issues involved and applying ethical theories—classified as consequentialist and deontological—in the decision-making process.
