An Assessment of Some Ethical Challenges to Employee Privacy and Consumer Privacy in the Business World

Abstract

Privacy is essential to individuals as it gives them space to be themselves without judgement and discrimination. Employers collect information about employees, and ethical issues arise while handling their records, even though there are instances when it is justified. However, employers are responsible for maintaining employee privacy to ensure credibility and improve employee performance. The increased use of the Internet and the boom of big data analytics have raised concerns regarding employee privacy. Internet users, especially consumers, state that they value privacy but obtain much material gain in exchange for sharing personal information. We assess the contentious issues that arise in these areas to argue that protecting privacy is a moral imperative and requires ethical sensitivity and support of the legislation. For this purpose, we delve into ethical approaches and the principles of protecting online privacy. We come to the view that protecting privacy in the workplace requires a coordinated moral solution between many parties.