Case Analysis

The purpose of this report is to enlighten the reader about the case issue and the impact of the case on the stakeholder associated with the organization. Ethics is considered as the most important part in business as it helps the management in swiftly moving in the direction of success without initiating wrongful actions (Hair , et. Al., 2015). The below mentioned report evaluates the issue and best actions for the stakeholders in the society. Further, more details about the report are discussed below:

The business deal between the Company X and Y made them to access their clients records. Faisal from Company Z is hired to develop the software program for the company to handle the access and retrieval of records from the database of both the companies. Faisal finds out that the software is working properly according to the requirements but there is some serious security threat in the database system of Company Y. This threat can make the privacy of both the companies into danger. On confronting the situation with the manager, he was being told that it was not their business and he should just focus on his software. Faisal is in big dilemma.

The main stakeholders of the case are:

• Company X
• Company Y
• IT team of Company Y
• Clients of Company X
• Clients of Company Y
• Company Z and Faisal (Simon 2015)

The major ideal that play a role in the decision making process is the ethics, code of conduct and integrity of an employee towards work and fair deed. Another major ideal is the concept of security threat and privacy breach on which the company should lay stress on.

The criteria of professional ethics should be emphasized in the given case. It is important for each and every organization to concentrate of the aspects of privacy breach because it affects the stakeholders of the organization as well. Along with this integrity and trust in the business environment is another criteria on which every person should focus, it does not matter that integrity and trust is maintain in an organization or between two organization but they should follow this activity. This, it can be said that professional ethics activities should be initiated in the environment using integrity and truthfulness (Eason 2014).

The obligation in the given case is one the Company Z and Faisal. This organization is hired by the Company X and Y to create a software with the help of which they can easily handle the retrieval and access of client’s information of both the organizations. However, it cannot be said that the complete obligation belong to the company Z because clearly they were not hired to find out the loopholes in the database systems of both the companies. One share of the obligation lies in the hand of the IT team of company Y to look into the matter and find out issues and solutions as well. The obligation of rectifying the software to secure the privacy breach is owed to the Information Technology team of Company Y and to the Company Z manager along with Faisal (Laudon, and Laudon 2016).

Main Stakeholders

The likely consequences for the stakeholders mentioned above are discussed below:

• Company X: This company will have to suffer the security risk threat without even acting initiating wrong actions in the environment.
• Company Y: This company had to pay the major consequences of the occurrence of the event. As the database of Company Y is ineffective, so it has to compensate with the Company X as well in case any issue occur.
• IT team of Company Y: This department of the organization is at fault because of which the whole issue arouse in the organization. The management had to suffer with penalties and various other concerns according to the norms of the company.
• Clients of Company X and Company Y: Information breach and lack of secrecy of personal information is the consequences of this event for the clients.
• Company Z and Faisal: The companies might never come into contract with this organization and also brand reputation and faith of clients can reduce (Miller, and Taddeo 2016).

The manager of the company Y and Faisal can perform the actions in the given case because no other person has the adequate information of the case. So, in this case actions that will harm or will not harm can only be performed by the end of Company Z only. Faisal has already intimated his manager about the security hole in database of the company Z (Parker 2017). So, ignorance of the manager in the case even after attaining adequate information of security issue can definitely harm the stakeholders of both the companies. As with this process, the database can become prone to hacker which might cause problem for the organizations. Further, in the scenario in which the manager of Company Z intimates such information to the Company Y and the ignorance of management of company Y in the case can also lead to serious threat and misconduct for the stakeholders of the case (Mason 2017).

The actions that will benefit the stakeholders are discussed below:

• Faisal intimating the manager about the security hole in database of company Y and manager understanding the serious threat.
• If manager denies then Faisal convincing the manager regarding the case and asking him to forward the information.
• Manager and agreeing of the terms of Faisal and forwarding the information to IT department of Company Y (Schwalbe 2015).
• Company Y taking strict actions regarding the case and rectifying the same.

Thus, it can be said that these actions will definite benefit all the stakeholders present in the given case.

On the part of the Company Z, according to the give case the management do not want to intimate such information to the Company Y because it is not a part of their duty. So, they are not concerned with the case and the actions taken.

Further, the other stakeholders would definitely require to initiate such actions that can definitely increase the privacy of clients and their information in the environment. It is important for every organization to operate under the professional code of ethics so the management should initiate actions that do not harm their reputation in the society and at the same time keep the client’s information safe and far from the hands of unethical hackers (Stahl, et. Al., 2014).

Yes, there are many ways to satisfy all the stakeholders present in the give case. However, the clients of both the organizations X and Y should be given more consideration than others because they the most important people whose information might leak in the environment without their consent. The clients of both the organization have not initiated and falsified actions or wrong deed but they would suffer anyhow if the hackers attain their personal information. So, these are the most important stakeholders present in the given case (Lavin, Harper, and Barr 2015). 

Ideals Playing Role in Decision

Actions that Show Respect

• Faisal in the given case should intimate the information of security hole to the management of the company Y and the manager on the other hand should provide such information to their client.
• The respected companies after intimation should initiate actions in such a way that their personal information is not leaked in the market without the client’s consent (Berry, et. Al., 2017).
• Both the companies X and Y along with the management team should work to save the data that they have and secure it from the hands of unethical hackers present in the market.

The above mentioned actions will definitely bring balance in the society and care and respect towards each other along with compliance with all the professional ethics as well.

The best action would be when the manager would understand the concern of Faisal. Further, he should have intimate Company Y and X as well regarding the issue and ask them to rectify the same. The IT team of company Y should perform the same and the IT team of company X should take care that all the action are performed effectively. Further, after completion of the event, the company should state the news to their clients as well. Lastly, the companies should create and long lasting and effective relationship with the company Z in future. They should also reward Faisal and company Z for going out of their league in order to maintain save the image of their clients (Floridi, and Taddeo 2016).

Lastly, it should be noted that even if the manager Company Z would not agree, he should have escalated the cause to higher authority and asked them to intimate the same because it was a concern of professional ethics.

Conclusion

Thus, in the limelight of above mentioned events, it should be noted that ethics is very important for the business to run smoothly without facing any problem in the target market.

References

Berry, D., Payton, F.C., Lakin, S. and White, E., 2017, June. Can we really show this?: ethics, representation and social justice in sensitive digital space. In Proceedings of the 17th ACM/IEEE Joint Conference on Digital Libraries (pp. 354-355). IEEE Press.

Eason, K.D., 2014. Information technology and organisational change. US: CRC Press.

Floridi, L. and Taddeo, M., (2016) What is data ethics? [online]. Retrieved from< https://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/374/2083/20160360> [accessed on 9 October 2018].

Hair Jr, J.F., Wolfinbarger, M., Money, A.H., Samouel, P. and Page, M.J., 2015. Essentials of business research methods. UK: Routledge.

Laudon, K.C. and Laudon, J.P., 2016. Management information system. Pearson Education India.

Lavin, M.A., Harper, E. and Barr, N., 2015. Health information technology, patient safety, and professional nursing care documentation in acute care settings. Online J Issues Nurs, 20(6).

Mason, R.O., 2017. Four ethical issues of the information age. In Computer Ethics (pp. 41-48). UK: Routledge.

Miller, K.W. and Taddeo, M., 2016. The Ethics of Information Technologies (Volume 4). UK: Routledge.

Parker, D.B., 2017. Rules of ethics in information processing. In Computer Ethics (pp. 17-20). UK: Routledge.

Schwalbe, K., 2015. Information technology project management. Cengage Learning.

Simon, J., 2015. Distributed epistemic responsibility in a hyperconnected era. In The Onlife Manifesto (pp. 145-159). Springer, Cham.

Stahl, B.C., Eden, G., Jirotka, M. and Coeckelbergh, M., 2014. From computer ethics to responsible research and innovation in ICT: The transition of reference discourses informing ethics-related research in information systems. Information & Management, 51(6), pp.810-818.