This paper examines the ethical dimensions of information technology through the lens of Mason's PAPA framework, which identifies Privacy, Accessibility, Property, and Accuracy as the four central ethical concerns of the information age. Drawing on Mason's foundational article and Introna's analysis of ethics in the information age, the paper reflects on how human society has transitioned from hunting and gathering physical resources to hunting and gathering information—and what that shift means for ethics. The paper considers how technology, while neutral in itself, reflects and challenges the values of the societies that create and use it, with particular attention to intellectual property, digital access inequality, and identity security.
One of the most striking observations in Mason's article is how human beings began as hunter-gatherers of food, materials for shelter, and means of defense — and how they have now become hunter-gatherers of information. Just as hunting and gathering shaped the kind of society humans formed millions of years ago, hunting and gathering information in the 21st century shapes the kinds of societies found in the West and in other cultures that are both technologically advanced and substantially technologically integrated. While the materials we hunt may have changed, the urge and commitment to hunting and gathering remain strong in the human species.
Mason's article is a general meditation on ethics during the information age and the implications that arise with the advent of technologies that continually change our daily lives. No matter at what point in human history we find ourselves, technology affects human beings on many levels — socially, economically, politically, and otherwise. From early forms of technology such as fire and writing, to current technologies such as nanotechnology and cloud computing, each engages, challenges, and questions the ethics of those who create, distribute, and use it.
Technology is often an exercise in defining the ethics of the people who make it and use it. Technology in itself is neutral, but how societies use technology reflects many aspects of those societies, including their ethics. Mason therefore sets out to study the implications and primary ethical situations that information-age technology presents, and to reflect on the 21st-century societies that have integrated these technologies into their ways of life.
Mason summarizes the main ethical questions of the information age with an acronym: PAPA. Broken down, PAPA stands for Privacy, Accessibility, Property, and Accuracy.
Privacy is one of the most obvious issues in the information age, especially given serious concerns such as identity theft and computer cracking in general. Some of the largest corporations have been breached, and these intrusions have been widely publicized — for example, crackers (not to be confused with hackers) who infiltrated companies such as Sony, Citibank, and News Corp.
Accessibility is a very basic but critical issue. Many people in many countries have poor, limited, or no access to information technologies that are considered standard in other cultures. There is not equal access to even basic technologies such as a stable Internet connection. This raises a fundamental question: should Internet and technology access be recognized as a basic human right, alongside water, literacy, shelter, and freedom?
Property is a further ethical concern. As Mason contends:
"One of the most complex issues we face as a society is the question of intellectual property rights. There are substantial economic and ethical concerns surrounding these rights; concerns revolving around the special attributes of information itself and the means by which it is transmitted. Any individual item of information can be extremely costly to produce in the first instance. Yet, once it is produced, that information has the illusive quality of being easy to reproduce and to share with others. Moreover, this replication can take place without destroying the original. This makes information hard to safeguard since, unlike tangible property, it becomes communicable and hard to keep to one's self." (p. 5)
"Ownership and ethics of digital information"
"Timeless ethical concerns in modern technological context"
Always verify citation format against your institution’s current style guide requirements.