When IT And Ethics Collide

[mrjohnchimpo]

pretty interesting article especially for someone in IT

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9035481&source=NLT_AM&nlid=1

for those computer folks, how does your company run it? i work at a huge company and we have to take an ethics course every year with lab examples that have obviously already happened in the company.

[paul]

from the article...
In a June 2007 poll of more than 16,000 U.S. IT practitioners, 62% said they had accessed another person's computer without permission and 50% read confidential or sensitive information without a legitimate reason. In addition, 42% said they had knowingly violated their company's privacy, security or IT policies.

... I thought that was an interesting stat.

Personally, I have access to lots of stuff, but don't really feel the urge to nose around in people's shit. I guess that puts me in the honest 38% minority of the "professionals" in this industry. Not because I have some great moral compass that guides me though life, more like because I'm too damn busy, and responding to my own overflowing email inbox is way more interesting, and pressing, than perusing somebody else's boring crap.

One of my friends argues that programmers, and other IT pros, should be licensed, like electricians, plumbers, etc... This way professional standards are dictated by a neutral party. Takes away the dilemmas encountered when yo try to figure out if you should bust your boss for surfing kiddie porn, even though he controls your life at work, but is also the guy that wrote the company policy against what he himself is doing.

Not that I'd be that interested in seeing it happen. I like the wild and wooly nature of the IT industry. Plus, I work with mostly smaller organizations, where these problems seem to be much less frequently encountered.

A lot of misbehavior at work is in large companies that treat their employees like brainless monkeys. Then, when their employees act like brainless monkeys and just spend the whole day wanking to internet porn, they act all surprised. I say... that's what they get!