Recently I was reading a post from Mrafrohead and I got to thinking, what has happened to us? As an IT professional there are many things I could do that I don’t, hack into restricted files, read others email, open my corporation up for attacks made either by myself or someone I know. These are all things that we all face everyday. I mean when was the last time you were doing a backup and thought I wonder how much bob in the next cubicle makes? Is it impossible to find out, no but you don’tdo you. Why? Because at sometime or another, be it at home or in school, you were taught the simple concept of ethical behavior, thats why. The IT community as a whole is faced daily with the right and wrong of the data we help to safeguard, so Iask you why are we the only ones concerned with ethics?
If big business can do whatever it wants, whenever it wants to, then why bother? I could never bring myself to do some of the things you see happening these days, but I also cannot condone it. I guess it all boils down to this in my mind please correct me if I am wrong; If you give me the keys to your house you trust me. If I steal your prized Ming Vase while you are out of town, you don’t trust me anymore. I am afraid Big businessis trying to steal the keys to my house and then trying to steal my Ming Vase and I never even gave them an invitation to come over. Where are the Ethics there? There are none. I am not afraid so much of Cyberterrorists as I am of Business. I am not afraid that they will inadvertantly harm me, I am afraid they will target me and people like me because I am tech savvy. Is there a line that needs to be drawn in the sand? Are there really limits to what an IT person will endure in the name ofcorperate success? Or, have we, like so many before us, just been lead down the primrose path, as fodder for the Big Business Juggernaught that really runs America?