Information Privacy

? MODULE 2 slipperiness Informational Privacy Without a doubt, we live in an environment where integrity, respect and trustworthy ethics play a fundamental role in the growth and success of many various(prenominal)s and companies. Unfortunately, this was non the shimmy for Patricia Dunn, former lead of the Hewlett-Packard (HP) board of directors who was forced to resign her job.She was at the center of a study controversy regarding her effort to enquire who from the board was leaking confidential information to the press about HPs interest in buying another engineering science company, their corporate strategy, business plans, hitherto their deliberations over who they would hire as CEO. This was a major issue as, not only was sensitive discussions of the board made public in the media, the level of trust between separately board member was greatly affected. In a 60 proceeding interview with Lesley Stahl and Patricia Dunn (CBS broadcast), the Hewlett-Packard board of direc tors was draw as a leaky ship.Secret board deliberations were ending up in the press leftover and right, and it was decided that someaffair had to be done. That something one can argue was the most famous leak investigating since Watergate, and beca persona of it, Patricia Dunn (who was chairman of the HP board of directors) was faced with criminal charges. The charges stem from the use of something c all(prenominal)ed pretexting where someone calls up the telephone set companies and impersonate someone else in order to obtain their records.This technique is more than than a simple delusion as it most often involves some prior research or set up and the use of pieces of known information (for example, impersonation, date of birth, social warrantor number -SSN) to establish legitimacy in the heed of the target. Pretexting, in my opinion, is clean-livingly wrong because it is deceitful and it invades the privacy of someone else regardless of how useful the act is in solving an investigating. Needless to say, privacy is a fundamental human right that almost every individual seeks to preserve.For the Hewlett-Packard case, board members privacy was in fact invaded but some may argue that such onset was for a cause. According to the deontological school of thought, the act may be considered the right thing to do even if it produces a bad consequence (as with the forced resignation of Patricia Dunn). For deontologists, the ends or consequences of the actions are not definitive in and of themselves neither are the intentions. Only the act itself is considered important. Immanuel Kant, a German philosopher, explain this theory of ethics more clearly. He argued that to act in the morally right way, people must act according to duty.That was the case with Patricia Dunn, she believed she had a duty to find out who was leaking sensitive details of discussions of the board to the press. In her 60 Minutes interview with Lesley Stahl, she express that many direc tors expressed to her their strong opinion that something had to be done to determine the man-made lake of the leak and to bring them to an end. In fact, majority of the directors told her during her first few weeks as Chairman that, next to conduct the boards CEO search, coming to grips with HPs famously leaky board should be her top priority.That was exaltly what Dunn did which was a major task in and of itself. Following on Kants argument, he claims, a person has a unassailable leave behind when he or she acts out of respect for the moral law. People act out of respect for the moral law when they act in some way because they have a duty to do so. So, the only thing that is truly good in itself is a good will, and a good will is only good when the willer chooses to do something because it is that persons duty. Thus, according to Kant, goodness depends on rightness. I think Patricia Dunn was simply doing her duty.Looking at the HP case in more detail, it is obvious that Patrici a Dunn did not know the full agenda of the private investigators and what was obscure in finding out who was the source of the leaks. Dunn says. The idea that I supervised, orchestrated, approved all of the ways in which this investigation occurred is just a complete myth. Its a falsehood. Its a damaging lie. She admit, however, seek advice from Bob Wayman, HPs then acting CEO , CFO and Director of Administration, on an affimative action to be interpreted on the problem of leaks in the company.He was well respected and trusted by many in the company so based on his integrity, she (Dunn) had every reason to rely on his recommendations as to how the security issues at the board level could best be handled given that all the control functions of the company were below his oversight. Mr Wayman referred her to an individual within his organisation who then referred her to Mr Delia (private investigator) who then took the extraordinary step of spying on the records of all the director s (including herself) as well as journalists. At some point during the investigation process in 2005, she (Dunn) became cognisant from Mr.Delia that phone records were accessed as a standard component of such investigations by HP. In an interview with NEWSWEEK, Dunn stated that she was aware HP was obtaining the phone records of suspected leakers as long ago as 2005. But she did not know about the pretexting until late June, when she saw an e-mail to Perkins from HPs outside counsel, Larry Sonsini and later acknowledged that HPs tactics were appall and embarrassing. Essentially, the investigation went on and the leaker of the companys sensitive discussions was identified.The public disclosure of the leaker at a board see did not sit well with some members on the board as they thought it could have been dealth with differently without cause embarrasment for the leaker . This led to a lot of uphoar and Patricia Dunn was forced to resign. I think her forced resignation grew out of a personal dispute between her and Perkins ( who was also a well-known member of the board of directors and a stiff friend of the leaker) . To me, Patricia Dunn did what she had to do for the best interest of the company.Hence, she should not have been forced to resign. Reading a narration by Hewlett-Packards Board of Directors, Pattie Dunn has been a valuable director of HP for many years. We acknowledge all of the good work that Pattie has accomplished on behalf of HP. She helped stabilized the business during the CEO transition. She led the search committee for our wise chief executive officer, which led to our hiring of Mark Hurd and the outstanding performance of the business over the last xviii months. She served our board with distinction as chairman for the last year and a half.The board felt it was important to find the sources of the leaks of HP confidential information, and she informed the board that she has taken steps to do so. We have never questioned her intentio ns, her integrity or her ethics.. we regret that we will lose her contributions to the board and appreciate that she has agree to our request. It is observable that she had good character and was well repected. She accepted the resposibility to identify the sources of the leaks but she did not propose the specific methods of the investigation which means the premise on which she was forced to resign was not justified