Information Privacy, Impact Assessment, and the Place of Ethics

There is now a flourishing but confusing debate about the ethics of artificial intelligence and other advanced technologies that use data extensively and intensively. There is a rush to define principles and frameworks for these activities, including the research that underlies innovations. This article illustrates and explores some of the perspectives, proposals, inventories and other materials that comprise these efforts. It begins with a look at the current interest in research ethics, and then highlights and comments on examples of the ethical frameworks, principles, and other schemes that have recently appeared. It then considers impact assessment of various kinds, especially regarding data-driven technologies, in which ethical and social issues or values are to the fore. It ends by touching on some issues that relate to attempts to devise ways of dealing with the adverse effects of advanced technologies and systems, including governance and the making of ethics-based judgments.