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Knowledge/A Level/H446/01 Computer systems/Moral and Ethical Issues/Analyse personal information

Analyse personal information

1.5.2 Moral and Ethical Issues

Moral and Ethical Issues — Note 7 of 9

Candidates need to understand the moral, social, ethical and cultural implications of using computers to analyse personal information (such as the gathering, storing and analysing of medical records).

What you need to know

Organisations collect and analyse large amounts of personal information, such as shopping habits, health records and social media activity. Analysis can improve services, but raises concerns about privacy, consent and security.

What to know

  • Examples: analysing medical records to improve treatment; loyalty cards used to target offers; social media data used for advertising; credit reference agencies.
  • Benefits: better and more personalised services; medical research; fraud detection; more efficient planning.
  • Risks: people may not know or have agreed to how their data is used; data can be combined to reveal sensitive information; data breaches expose personal data; data may be sold on.
  • Profiling can lead to unfair treatment, e.g. higher insurance prices or targeted political messaging.
  • Data protection law requires personal data to be used fairly, for specified purposes, and kept secure.

Exam technique

  • Tip:Link your points to the data protection principles where relevant.

Moral and Ethical Issues

Note 7 of 9

  1. 1Computers in the workforce
  2. 2Automated decision making
  3. 3Artificial intelligence
  4. 4Environmental effects
  5. 5Censorship and the Internet
  6. 6Monitor behaviour
  7. 7Analyse personal information
  8. 8Piracy and offensive communications
  9. 9Layout, colour paradigms and character sets
Topic overview
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