Proceedings of the Wellington Faculty of Engineering Ethics and Sustainability Symposium

Creating a Code of Ethics for Social Engineering in Cybersecurity: A Case Study

Abraham Alfred — 2022-07-07

The world of cybersecurity is fast growing and has the need of more competent social engineers who can train staff and improve training further in the industry. They can engage with people if they were to either get information out of them or to educate them on their own. They can then further educate their workplace’s cybersecurity posture towards social engineering attacks such as phishing, raising awareness about spyware, and teaching new personnel about the importance of upholding a professional standard while out on client engagements.

Code of Ethics for Facial Recognition Systems: A Case Study

Jaya Narayan — 2022-07-07

The integration of Facial Recognition Systems (FRS) in society is increasing. A key factor in adequate performance for FRS is the reliance on user data. Hence it is important not only to understand the ethical issues surrounding FRS but also to ensure that a proper code of ethics is established. This paper analyses and discusses the ethical issues with existing FRS as well as ethical conducts that are already put in place. Additionally, a new code of ethics will be created for FRS. Furthermore, a case study of a specific project involving FRS is conducted. Each principle listed in the newly created code of ethics is applied to the selected project.

An Ethical Framework for Facial Recognition Use in New Zealand

Emma Taumoepeau — 2022-07-07

Facial recognition technology is an increasingly growing, constantly adapting technology. It can serve many benefits for legal entities in many ways. Examples of this would be biometric recognition or border control at an airport. Because of its power and efficiency, many legal entities are looking to utilise this technology. With this continued growth comes ethical concerns about ensuring data privacy for individuals whose data is collected, used, and stored to power this technology. Currently, there is a lack of an ethical framework for legal entities to adopt, follow and utilise within New Zealand. This makes it an ethical grey area for the businesses and individuals looking to utilise this technology. This document aims to review existing frameworks about facial recognition technology,
finally concluding a code of ethics for facial recognition use in New Zealand for the engineering profession.

Case Study: Code of Ethics for Facial Recognition Technology

Isabella Tomaz Ketley — 2022-07-07

Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) is a way of identifying an individual by comparing their facial signature to a database of known faces. It has many current uses, and this is only expected to grow due to its many potential and promising applications. However, this technology presents a lot of ethical issues that need to be addressed. This paper examines current literature to find the current ethical issues of FRT such as its usage to infringe on one’s privacy, use an individual’s data without their consent and misidentify individuals. Based on these issues, a code of ethics will be created that will ensure an individual's privacy and data security and minimize the biases and misidentifications in FRT. This code of ethics is applied and assessed via a case study about the usage of live facial recognition technology in the New Zealand Police.

Recommendations for Ethical Usage of Facial Recognition Technology

Christopher Benfell — 2022-07-07

This paper investigates the current state of Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) and the ethical concerns surrounding it discussed in literature. Based on these concerns, a code of ethics is developed to provide recommendations on how to use FRT ethically. The essence of this code is to protect the rights of citizens and to use FRT in a way that minimizes misuse and benefits all. Finally, a specific use case of FRT is introduced to demonstrate how the proposed code of ethics can be applied effectively to a real project. The findings are then summarized, and recommendations made going forward.

Ethics of Facial Recognition Technology in Law Enforcement: A Case Study

Oscar Camplin — 2022-07-07

Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) has promising applications in law enforcement due to its efficiency and cost-effectiveness. However, this technology poses significant ethical concerns that overshadow its benefits. Responsible use of FRT requires consideration of these ethical concerns that legislation fails to cover. This study investigates the ethical issues of FRT use and relevant ethical frameworks and principles designed to combat these issues. Drawing on this, we propose and discuss a code of ethics for FRT to ensure its ethical use in the context of New Zealand law enforcement.

Code of Ethics for Automatic Speech Recognition

John Eleigio Cecilio — 2022-07-07

Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), which turns human speech into text, has had a long history of development and continues to improve and expand. Both academic and industry discussions on the technology present ethical issues regarding the privacy, security, and use of user data, as well the accuracy of ASR for different demographics. This paper reviews the literature on such ethical issues and proposes a code of ethics that addresses them. A case study on Google ASR products is conducted, evaluating that the industry still has improvements to make, especially in user data collection and use, and in accuracy.

Facial Recognition Technology and Ethical Issues

Jason Chan — 2022-07-07

Facial recognition technology (FRT) is being adopted across the world with little thought given to the ethical and sustainability issues it faces. FRT must address these challenges as soon as possible to avoid repercussions. The issues of data privacy, security controls, and accuracy are discussed in this paper. To address the issues, a code of ethics is created and applied to Apple’s Face ID. It is found that Apple has made much progress, but still needs further improvement in its transparency of AI training.

Computer Game Design: A Code of Ethics

Bryony Church — 2022-07-07

This paper examines ethical issues involved in the production of computer games. A review of the current literature available is conducted to understand the work that has been completed on this subject and to identify any areas that require more analysis. The learnings from this review are used to inform a code of ethics for computer game design, based on a number of key principles. This is then tested with a case study of a computer game in production to demonstrate its use.

Creating a Code of Ethics for Open-Source Intelligence Applications

Vaibhav Ekambaram — 2022-07-07

This paper investigates the ethics surrounding the development and use of applications for mapping and quantifying information, which relies on public or open-source data as a source of information. The proliferation of information-based dashboards and maps has increased as the open availability of information has improved, through open data initiatives, social media web crawling, and the development of open-source intelligence gathering as a profession. A common product where this burgeoning profession manifests itself is the creation of web-based dashboards. Popular examples of this include dashboards for tracking the spread of the coronavirus, maps for visualising world news such as conflict or natural disasters, or collaborative projects such as OpenStreetMap, which relies on community input, as well as open data initiatives to build a comprehensive map of the world. As a number of these projects cover information that is of high importance, such as actions taken by belligerents in a combat zone, or the localised identification of important historical sites, this brings into question several moral and ethical issues which must be identified. Several examples of these issues, and the ethical ramifications surrounding them are discussed in this paper in the form of a literature review. Following this, a new code of ethics is introduced based on the findings presented by the literature review. To evaluate its suitability, this new code is applied to an existing open-source information solution and compare how well it follows my principles in its development and operation.

Code of Ethics for Facial Recognition

Caitlin Fisher — 2022-07-07

Facial Recognition is a big part of surveillance and security in recent years. Along with any technology there are ethical issues that need to be considered when designing, creating, and using the system. This paper reviews the literature and their codes of ethics and ethical issues surrounding facial recognition to draw conclusions about the most important principles. Issues discussed include bias, collection of data, transparency, vulnerable population, security, and accountability. With these conclusions a code of ethics is introduced to improve or justify the current literature. Elaborations are made on each principle to justify the issue and inform specific ways to make the system ethical. This new code of ethics is then used to analyse the ethics around facial recognition in schools.

The Ethical Considerations of Artificial Intelligence in Clinical Decision Support

Taran John — 2022-07-07

With the explosion in technological innovation facilitating the advent of artificially intelligent systems, specifically clinical decision support, a unique subset of ethical and sustainability concerns arises. Although this technology possesses remarkable potential to revolutionise the healthcare industry, it becomes apparent that an innovative ethical framework must be posited to facilitate integration into the mainstream. Due to the sensitive nature of healthcare, ethical oversights pertaining to incorporation of such technologies would lead to the detriment of its public perception, potentially stigmatising related systems for years to come. By delving into the literature surrounding the idiosyncratic ethical considerations of artificially intelligent clinical decision support in this paper, best practices which seek to mitigate the impact of these concerns emerge. The objective of this work is to assimilate these best practices, which are used in the synthesis of a six principle code of ethics which are as follows: protect healthcare professional authority, ensure technological non-maleficence, cultivate clinical decision support transparency, establish procedures for accountability determination, promote sustainability of artificially intelligence based clinical decision support and encourage equity in the training and deployment of clinical decision support. These principles are then applied to the real world of Watson for Oncology by IBM, to assess the adherence of the product to ethical and sustainability best practices.

Code of Ethics for Autonomous Vehicles

Callum Macaskill — 2022-07-07

This case study focuses on autonomous vehicles and the ethical and sustainable considerations surrounding them. Autonomous vehicles have potential to greatly impact a variety of areas of daily life in a large scale, such as public health and privacy. It is important to address the concerns of autonomous vehicles before they are completely introduced to market. Proactive planning of how autonomous vehicles should be designed will be useful for creating a smoother timeline of achieving valuable implementations of the technology. For these reasons, the uncertain future of autonomous vehicles should be guided towards ethical and sustainable outcomes with a code of ethics. This paper therefore proposes a possible code of ethics, guided by a literature review on autonomous vehicles and a historic case analysis. The developed code is justified through findings from the literature and considering how it is applicable to a real-world event and the future of transportation.

Facial Recognition Technology Code of Ethics

Michaiah Thoms — 2022-07-07

Facial recognition technology (FRT) is a tool used to identify individuals by scanning their face and comparing it to a database of facial images. In the last decade, the use of FRT has rapidly increased and is now used all around the world. This has resulted in many ethical issues caused by taking an individual’s images without consent to train FRT programs, FRT misidentifying individuals, and using FRT to classify individuals as part of specific groups based on appearance alone. Because of these issues, a new code of ethics is proposed to provide a guideline for the creation and use of FRT. The code of ethics will prevent images of individuals from being taken and used without their consent and prevent FRT from being used unethically.

Virtual Assistants: A Code of Ethics

Tian Welgemoed — 2022-07-07

An intelligent virtual assistant (IVA) like Amazon’s Alexa supports clients remotely by performing administrative, technological, or creative tasks. IVAs have become a part of our daily lives and collect large sums of data about their users, meaning we need a proper code of ethics to protect people’s rights to privacy as there are data leakage concerns. In this paper, I outline a code of ethics for IVAs based on research and a case study on Amazon Alexa to recognize the key principles that a code of ethics for IVAs requires to protect its users. This code of ethics can be used for development of new IVAs or updating of existing ones in order for them to follow improved ethics principles.

Code of Ethics for Robotics: A Surgery Case Study

Griffin Almand — 2022-07-07

The future of robotics is broad and varied. New developments that delve deeper into the use of artificial intelligence and automation, for practices ranging from driver less cars to doctor less surgeries, calls for a defined code of cultural, ethical, and legal regulations that can guide engineers around the most delicate issues that may arise. With the reputation of the field resting on the evolution of a code of ethics this paper compares and discusses existing literature on the subject. With the foundation and influence of the existing literature this paper proposes a refined code of ethics designed to target the specific area of robotic engineering. It is also designed to remain applicable for future developments in the field. Having laid out the code it is then be applied to a case study focusing on surgery robots. Final recommendations and conclusions are made to advise future developments for an ethical code targeted at robotic engineers.

Smart Grid Systems Code of Ethics

Mitchell Beserra — 2022-07-07

The use of smart technology in the electrical distribution industry provides the opportunity to better support the addition of renewable technology. These smart grids utilise enhanced communication systems to enable an intelligent response to changes in the network. However, with them comes ethical concerns that should be addressed during development and operation. This paper investigates these concerns and aims to produce a code of ethics that can be used to guide decision making throughout the smart grid lifecycle. These principles draw from concerns around privacy, socio-political impacts, and safety and security. The result is a set of six principles that address these main issues and are demonstrated in a hypothetical case study.

Component Standardization: A Code of Sustainability

Emanuel Evans — 2022-07-07

To make mass manufacturing industries more sustainable, there is a need to unify regulations and embrace shared principles to ensure that the products we produce are more sustainable. With attention to reducing the impact on the natural environment. In this paper, we argue that a code of sustainability regarding component standardization would help in this regard. It would contribute to extending the life of what we produced by facilitating the reuse of components as well as improving their recycling once they deteriorate. We then apply our proposed principles to the automotive sector to demonstrate their practical benefits.

A Code of Ethics for Self-Driving Vehicles

Magdalene Gleadow — 2022-07-07

As self-driving technology advances, relevant ethical frameworks must be developed to guide the engineering profession. This paper provides a deeper understanding of the ethical issues associated with self-driving vehicles. It reviews the relevant literature which makes it clear that there are several key ethical issues which must inform the development of a code of ethics specific to this field. These can be grouped into the four key principles: responsibility, safety, transparency and sustainability. The proposed code of ethics is then applied to a specific case study to evaluate it. The case study introduced is that of self-driving cars as rental cars with specific reference to the New Zealand context. This case study provides a complex real-world situation for the proposed code to be evaluated with. Applying the code of ethics to this case study indicates that the proposed code of ethics offers a relevant ethical framework to guide the engineering profession in self-driving vehicles.

Sustainability Assessment of Wind Farms

Jake Hobbs — 2022-07-07

Sustainable energy solutions are becoming increasingly popular as the shift away from conventional fuel-based energy solutions continues. Solar, wind, and hydro solutions are the most frequently used renewable energy sources. Modern wind energy solutions are usually constructed using a design of a large three-bladed horizontal axis wind turbine (HAWT). The blades are upwind facing, which helps support the turbine tower against environmental strain and torque ripple produced from the spinning motion of the blades. HAWTs are usually organised into large groups referred to as wind farms. Wind farms are becoming increasingly popular with their ability to adapt to offshore and onshore environments. In both scenarios, wind turbines have a relatively low footprint, with the land underneath still available to be utilised for agricultural and aquacultural purposes. This paper investigates the sustainability of wind farms by surveying a range of papers. The papers will cover the development, construction, and continued operation of wind turbines providing insights into the sustainability issues. Reviewing these papers will allow for an informed revision to the code of sustainability for future implementations of wind farms. The paper concludes with a case study to apply the suggested sustainability code in a contextual scenario and recommendations for the general engineering profession.

Agriphotovoltaics Code of Ethics

Donald MacKenzie — 2022-07-07

Solar photovoltaic (PV) technologies are recognised globally as a means of supplying affordable renewable electricity, while mitigating global carbon emissions. However, the development of large PV farms requires large surface areas due to the disperse nature of solar energy. Academic literature has identified Agriphotovoltaics (AgriPV); the dual-use of cropland for agriculture and PV electricity production, as a potential solution to reduce conflict between the two sectors. This paper addresses the social dimension of AgriPV systems, by suggesting a code of ethics for the technology. The suggested code of ethics ensures that the livelihoods of farmers and local communities are upheld; ensures farmers are well prepared to work at AgriPV sites; prioritises crop production in AgriPV systems; and ensures the preservation of farmland and local values. A case study of a proposed AgriPV development in Helensville, Aotearoa – New Zealand, is then used to assess the effectiveness of the code of conduct.

Ethical Considerations for Renewable Energy Systems on Māori Land

Fraser McConnell — 2022-07-07

Sustainable engineering projects often involve renewable energy systems. Attempts to develop renewable energy systems on Māori land can cause ethical conflicts. This report examines Māori values and perspectives relevant to the development of renewable energy systems on Māori land. A code of ethics is developed taking these values into account to assist in the design process of such projects. This code of ethics is applied in a case study of installing a renewable energy system for a marae. This code of ethics promotes a greater awareness of the impacts the system will have on environment and community, and promotes a respect for the individual values of the impacted iwi.

Civil Drone Ethics and Sustainability

Daniel Strawbridge — 2022-07-07

In order to solve the largely ignored issues of civil drones it is imperative to develop a framework that assures an ethical and sustainable practice. This paper analyses continuing ethical and sustainable issues, then reviews existing literature focused on these issues and their recommended solutions. Highlighted while reviewing literature was the common shortcoming of not considering that sensors other than cameras can breach privacy. Furthermore, a revised code of ethics/sustainability is developed and divided into the following principles: flying zones, data acquisition, data processing, and sustainable practice. To evaluate the code of ethics/sustainability it was applied to a case study of inspecting a solar farm in New Zealand. The case study showed the code created
a non-invasive and sustainable drone practice. Rapid civil drone development calls for further development of this paper and related studies.

Code of Ethics: A Transoral Robotic Surgery Case Study

Yun Zhou — 2022-07-07

Robotics is a high technology that integrates various disciplines such as computer engineering, artificial intelligence, mechanics, bionics, and so forth. Due to its interdisciplinary nature, multiple fields such as engineering, medical, computer and Human-Robot Interaction (HRI) are reviewed in order to satisfy the objective that to develop a code of ethics for robotics. For the main outcomes of the paper, a code of ethics that combines multiple fields is produced. In total, there are five essential ethical principles that are outlined in the code of ethics. In addition, the paper also proposes the idea that there can be a concise ethical risk assessment to apply to any robotic product or service in order for any stakeholders to intervene in time to calibrate its ethical value, such that the robotic technology can truly be beneficial to human society.