Morality & Data

Convener

Vince Speelman

Attendees

• Vince Speelman
• [Lorinda Brandon] (http://twitter.com/lindybrandon)
• John Pedrie
• Jeff Pryciak
• [RV Mendoza] (http://twitter.com/RVxMendoza)

Notes

Terms of Service

• Should they have “nutrition labels” or TL;DRs?
• An OAuth-style list of permissions might be a nice way to present it
• Users are left with no alternative, as nearly every company has an overly-broad ToS to cover their own asses against legal action

Solutions

• Avoid unintended consequences (many users will quickly give more info than needed without paying attention.)
• Allow users to remove themselves from your database
• Take the smallest responsible bite of data
• Periodically remind users what their terms of use meant wrt to data (in plain English) and update users when you change how you use their data

Creepy Shit

• Location history
  • iOS: Settings>Privacy>Location Services>System Services>Frequent Locations
  • Android: https://maps.google.com/locationhistory/
• Google Now: Creepy or Convenient? Both.
• Facebook shadow profiles
• Dead people never die

Good Shit

• Civic Value
• The Greater Good

Immorality

• Is owning another person's data immoral?
  • Yes. It's like owning them.
  • No. It's what you do with the data.
• When there is no product, you are the product.
• Is discriminating based on collected data immoral (ex: insurance companies raising / lowering rates)
  • Yes. It's mean and hyper-capitalistic, especially if you're required to use the service (insurance)
  • No. if the data exists, it makes sense to provide tiered service based on it
• Actuaries Have been around for hundreds of years.

Some Mentioned Media

• Ordering Pizza in the Future

Takeaways

• As developers, we have a great opportunity to “push hard” for data ethics and morality.
• Maybe tech companies aren't that smart about our data (ex: ordering gifts can change amazon suggestions because they can't derive context)
• Would you refuse to collect data that you found immoral? Quitting your job means your kids starve and die, but collecting the data means you could kill them later.
• The danger is in perpetuity. Once you've collected the data, your intentions and use of it can change later (for the better or for the worse)

Additional Considerations

The ToS:DR browser extension might be worth a look.