Paper B1

Ethical issue: falsifying your profile on a social networking site

Stakeholders

autonomy

publicity

veracity

1: Yourself

You have the duty to maximize the right to make your own decisions.

You have the duty to take actions based on ethical standards that must be known and recognized by all who are involved.

You have the duty to tell the truth

2: Other users of the networking site

They have the duty to make their own decisions

They make these decisions based on ethical standards that should be recognized by the person falsifying their profile

They assume that the person falsifying the profile has the duty to tell the truth.

3: The social networking site

The autonomy of the site is limited by law (Goldman, 2007)

Users of social networking sites are content publishers, as such the site must take actions based on legal and ethical standards and must notify users of these standards so they are known by all.

As providers of content the site must conform to the laws regarding truth or be held responsible for legal issues as defamation (making harmful false statements about someone else) or copyright infringement. (Goldman, 2007)