There was not only a technological breach that must be addressed with Apply Yourself, but also an ethical breach by the students who bypassed private systems to access information about their MBA applications at various schools. There should an investigation into possible legal action that can be taken by Apply Yourself and the educational institutes in order to punish the hacker “brookbond” with applicable crimes. Although it is apparent that brookbond hacked this information to enlighten students, there is no way to know whether or not brookbond gathered additional information about applicants or the schools.
My initial reaction to students who accessed this information is not one of surprise. MBA applicants and students are likely curious …show more content…
As knowledge and information hungry as MBA applicants are likely to be, knowingly accessing a system which contained information that was not yet intended for the applicants is a breach of ethics.
According to utilitarianism, the hacker brookbond did the right thing. He revealed important, life-changing information for the benefit of the public. It was a selfless risk to take on the part of the hacker. I believe the students who accessed the information, however, did the wrong thing according to utilitarianism. Accessing the restricted information does not visibly benefit society or anybody else, it only benefits the applicant. This poses an interesting dynamic to utilitarianism.
According to the ethical principle of justice, the students that accessed the information should be punished equally. The unethical process the students used to access information must result in consequences that are equal to all the students that accessed the information. The consequences for the hacker brookbond should be different, and more severe, than the …show more content…
They disregarded honesty, fairness, self-control, integrity, and prudence in order to pursue something that would have been made known to them eventually. If they would have been patient, they could have held all of these virtues intact.
The ethical principle of categorical imperative would state that the actions of the hacker and the students were wrong. Hacking systems is wrong, and would not be okay if it were a universal principle. However, revealing information about people is okay as a universal principle because people have a right to know information about themselves. Accessing a hacked system would not be okay as a universal principle, however, gaining knowledge about yourself would be okay as a universal principle. This ethical principle adds quite an interesting dynamic to the situation.
The information that was accessed by the applicants is not necessarily a ‘big deal’ in the sense that accessing this information will not cause harm to people or do any sort of injustice to any individual. However, applicants accessing this information is a ‘big deal’ in that their ethical and moral compass is called into question. These are not the types of students that I would want to attend my school or work for my
My initial reaction to students who accessed this information is not one of surprise. MBA applicants and students are likely curious …show more content…
As knowledge and information hungry as MBA applicants are likely to be, knowingly accessing a system which contained information that was not yet intended for the applicants is a breach of ethics.
According to utilitarianism, the hacker brookbond did the right thing. He revealed important, life-changing information for the benefit of the public. It was a selfless risk to take on the part of the hacker. I believe the students who accessed the information, however, did the wrong thing according to utilitarianism. Accessing the restricted information does not visibly benefit society or anybody else, it only benefits the applicant. This poses an interesting dynamic to utilitarianism.
According to the ethical principle of justice, the students that accessed the information should be punished equally. The unethical process the students used to access information must result in consequences that are equal to all the students that accessed the information. The consequences for the hacker brookbond should be different, and more severe, than the …show more content…
They disregarded honesty, fairness, self-control, integrity, and prudence in order to pursue something that would have been made known to them eventually. If they would have been patient, they could have held all of these virtues intact.
The ethical principle of categorical imperative would state that the actions of the hacker and the students were wrong. Hacking systems is wrong, and would not be okay if it were a universal principle. However, revealing information about people is okay as a universal principle because people have a right to know information about themselves. Accessing a hacked system would not be okay as a universal principle, however, gaining knowledge about yourself would be okay as a universal principle. This ethical principle adds quite an interesting dynamic to the situation.
The information that was accessed by the applicants is not necessarily a ‘big deal’ in the sense that accessing this information will not cause harm to people or do any sort of injustice to any individual. However, applicants accessing this information is a ‘big deal’ in that their ethical and moral compass is called into question. These are not the types of students that I would want to attend my school or work for my