VV076 Ethics and Information Technology

Faculty of Informatics
Spring 2023
Extent and Intensity
2/0/0. 2 credit(s) (plus extra credits for completion). Type of Completion: k (colloquium).
Teacher(s)
Mgr. Tomáš Foltýnek, Ph.D. (lecturer)
Bc. Jakub Judiny (assistant)
Bc. Martina Kozlová (assistant)
Mgr. Jan Kvapil (assistant)
Denisa Lakoštíková (assistant)
Lujza Laudová (assistant)
Adam Mydla (assistant)
Martina Stankovičová (assistant)
Martin Tvarožek (assistant)
Guaranteed by
Mgr. Tomáš Foltýnek, Ph.D.
Department of Computer Science – Faculty of Informatics
Supplier department: Department of Computer Science – Faculty of Informatics
Timetable
Thu 16. 2. to Thu 11. 5. Thu 10:00–11:50 A318, except Thu 20. 4. ; and Thu 20. 4. 10:00–11:50 B517
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is also offered to the students of the fields other than those the course is directly associated with.
fields of study / plans the course is directly associated with
Course objectives
To acquaint students with ethical problems associated with information technology, ethical dilemmas, and ways to solve them. The course deals with ethical issues related to the collection, storage, processing, and presentation of data and information, algorithms to support decision-making, and their social overlap.
Learning outcomes
The ability to identify problems related to information technology ethics and the ability to analyze these problems in a structured way. The ability to solve moral dilemmas related to information technology, including a thorough argumentation of the chosen solution. The ability to debate moral dilemmas, understand opponents' opinions, and be able to accept them, or deal with them in an argument.
Syllabus
  • 1. Introduction to ethics, basic concepts: Ethics, morality, values, virtues. Moral dilemma, Discussion of moral dilemmas: Debate and dialogue
  • 2. Ethical data handling: How to produce and collect data ethically? Who owns the data? Surveillance capitalism
  • 3. Ethical aspects of social media and news servers: Positive and negative content and its attractiveness, Pay-per-click and social responsibility
  • 4. Media manipulation and misinformation on the Internet: Consequences of poor quality, misleading and hateful content on the Internet, How can information technology prevent or limit the spread of misinformation?
  • 5. ChatGPT: How does it disrupt education? And how to use it ethically?
  • 6. Information filtering and censorship: When can information filtering be considered ethical? New Great Wall of China, The right to be forgotten in the EU
  • 7. Bias in algorithms: Ethical aspects of data transformation into information and knowledge, Ethical aspects of data presentation
  • 8. Internet and copyright: "Remix" culture, Public domain and Creative commons licence, Plagiarism issues
  • 9. Ethical hacking: Hackers' mind, when is hacking ethical, Bug bounty programs
  • 10. Academic integrity and plagiarism: Open access and open data, Predatory journals
  • 11. Information technologies for prevention and detection of unethical behavior: Plagiarism detection, Proctoring systems, Blockchain
  • 12. Ethics of artificial intelligence: Ethics by design, ethics in design, ethics for design. Laws of robotics
  • 13. Professional ethics in IT: What does "being a good IT professional" mean?, Ethical issues in IT design and development
Teaching methods
Lectures
Assessment methods
Active participation in lectures is expected, ie prior acquaintance with the submitted articles, participation in the discussion, participation in the voting and filling in a short answer to each class.
The colloquium is awarded after obtaining 60 points out of 110:
30 points: Active participation in classes - short answers to articles; active participation in discussion
40 points (or 2 x 20 points): Elaboration on a chosen topic - An essay or presentation within a lecture
20 points: Analysis of the influence of ChatGPT in a selected course
10 points: Critical feedback on someone else's essay
10 points: Online activities - Tips on interesting articles in course discussion forum; Contributions on social media, blogs, etc.
Language of instruction
Czech
Further Comments
Study Materials
The course is taught annually.
The course is also listed under the following terms Spring 2022, Spring 2024.
  • Enrolment Statistics (Spring 2023, recent)
  • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/fi/spring2023/VV076