Poking into privacy issues
We could write another thick book on privacy issues in the business the growth of Web-based application like email, online shopping and electronic bill payments, not to mention social media and functions like Google Maps with street View, Privacy and the protection of personal information is one of the hot topics of the early 21st century. High-profile cases-the infamous Craigslist Killer, the Google engineers who used their computer skills to mine personal information from the company's data files, and numerous cases of stolen or compromised consumer data-only add to the concerns about privacy and personal safety incidents like these give HR and IT folks ulcers and cause corporate lawyers and risk-management officers to lose sleep worrying about liability issues and of course ,from an ethics standpoint, privacy concerns present several challenges . Technology allows managers to gain unprecedented knowledge about employee and customer behavior. Although this information is useful even critical, in forming business strategies, the very depth and breadth of the data carries with it a much greater moral responsibility to ensure that it isn't misused or abused, either through carelessness or with malicious intent
Protecting workers' privacy
Media reports about identity theft tend to focus on protection of consumer data (see the following section). But a Michigan state university study in 24 found that more than 50 percent of personal-information thefts occur in the workplace, and nine out of ten identity-theft cases involve employee information-not customer information. Payroll and personnel records typically provide all the data a thief needs to open fraudulent credit accounts
Protecting employee data is clearly not a responsibility to take lightly. But many businesses-from small mom and pop operations to large corporations-frequently expose such information to risk, and thereby expose themselves to potentially huge penalties. The most common bad practices include
- Falling to keep employee files and payroll records in locations such as lockable file cabinet(or neglecting to use the locks on the cabinets)
- using social security numbers as identifiers on insurance cards or other documents
- leaving original documents on open-access copies or fax machines
Safeguarding customer information
Business as usual these days means collecting and often keeping a wealth of information on customer. Web sites like Amazon.com and others allow frequent shoppers to store their credit card information permanently-a great convenience to people who don't want to enter their information every time they make a purchase, but also a great temptation to hackers, who may break into electronic files just for the fun of it or for more sinister purposes