Is it Ethical for the Government to Retain Data of All Consumers

Mandatory Data Retention Laws in Australia

Ethics on Communication Details Being Recorded and Stored

The main issue concerning the topic is the aspect of whether it is right or wrong to keep data and information with respect to privacy and confidentiality as the data retention implies that the private information of the public will be accessed without their consent. There are many parties who are likely being impacted by these concerns. To start with, there is the general public whose private information will be accessed and retained devoid of any informed consent (Coyne, 2015).

The other parties who are likely to be impacted will be companies whose sensitive information will be accessed and hacking of such data could have adverse effects on their business operations. As opined by Coyne (2015), with the introduced aspect of protection class warrants being voted down, it implies that even journalists who might have information that is sensitive and even lawyers would be impacted as their private information would be retained for a two-year period like everyone else and not three months as had been proposed by the members of parliament (Coyne, 2015).

There is a fundamental underlying ethical dilemma in the chosen scenario. The major ethical dilemma is the ethical aspect of respecting the privacy and confidentiality of data and information regarding the general public. This is because the public ought to be given the assurance that all aspects of their communication ought to be handled with utmost confidence. When the privacy of clients and people is disregarded or overlooked, they end up being injured in apparent or subtle ways or manners. Data and information such as information texted, location of communication as well as the dates and times of communication ought to be all handled as confidential (Asha, 2013).

The ethical dilemma is that on one hand, it implies consenting to provide personal data and information for examination by law enforcement officials and agencies. The question considered is whether the risk at hand is great, in reference to severity and incidence, as to espouse and accept the relinquishment of the civil rights and freedoms that distinguish Australia as a liberal self-governing nation from authoritarian administrations.

Metadata which encompasses amassing the personal information of the public can easily create a very detailed and invasive picture regarding the privacy of individuals. It is imperative to take note that without doubt, the information being retained does not necessarily have to be personal or private in order to be considered revealing (Daly, 2014).

For instance, according to Daly (2014), a research study undertaken at the University of Stanford regarding metadata from telephone communication demonstrated from its findings that this information being amassed could easily reveal the political affiliation as also religious affiliation of an individual in addition to other intimate and sensitive details regarding that individual's life. This is a predominantly vital discovery for Australians taking into consideration the current plans by the government to continue with the implementation of mandatory retention of all consumers (Daly, 2014).

Some of the possible ramifications of this ethical issue include the hacking of sensitive information of individuals and companies and holders of sensitive information such as lawyers. In addition, sensitive information such as blueprints for companies could easily be hacked and accessed by rivaling companies (Daly, 2014).

Another possible ramification is that it would be easy for someone to hack and obtain information of the public with regard to who they communicate to, their financial information and even more, their physical address where they reside. Some of the applicable solutions would be, first, not retaining sensitive information such as those being retained and maintained by lawyers as this might have grave consequences (Daly, 2014).

In addition, it is important not to retain information of the innocent public but rather to maintain information of possible criminal suspects or any kind of wrong doing. For instance, as mentioned by Dalby (2014), information for an 80-year-old grandmother does not seem important or beneficial to crime, yet such information could be harmful to the member of public as sensitive information of her could be accessed by the wrong parties (Daly, 2014).

Likely Use of Metadata Obtained

Metadata can be defined as the information that is created or that comes about as one employs technology. This information is created by the computer, phone, tablet, smart watch, and even the times at which being used (Dalby, 2014).

This collection of telecommunications information and data more often than not consists of personal and particular content details, in addition to transactional data and information regarding the user, the device used and the different activities going on. This data collected includes the content of the posts and the web pages associated with them, the internet service provider (ISP) and the internet provider, cached data from websites and also cookies from the browser details (Dalby, 2014).

The likely main use of metadata obtained will be to assist law enforcement agencies in the investigation of criminal activities (Coyne, 2015). For instance, communication that by criminals over the phone can be easily tapped and accessed to gain an understanding as to what kind of activities they plan to undertake (Coyne, 2015)..

This will not only assist law enforcement agencies in the investigations but at the same time, will make it much easier for them to catch wrongdoers for the acts done. In addition, with the personal information of individuals already accessed, it will be possible for agencies of law enforcement to be able to locate and pinpoint where probable wrong doers are.

Will it stop at metadata or will law enforcement agencies be privy to exact transcripts of our messages

It is largely feared that this aspect will not stop only at metadata and that law enforcement agencies might in fact be privy to exact transcripts of the messages collected. This is because first of all the metadata collected already contains information that can be easily read. According to Dalby (2014), when we freely make use of accessible tools and components to observe and monitor data regarding communications such as Facebook, Twitter as well as other social and commercial websites, it can be seen that the metadata which is collected does in fact include content which can be read (Daly, 2014).