Information ethics in the age of digital labour and the surveillance-industrial complex

Abstract

The rise of computing and the internet have brought about an ethical field of studies that some term information ethics, computer ethics, digital media ethics, or internet ethics The aim of this contribution is to discuss information ethics’ foundations in the context of the internet’s political economy The chapter first looks to ground the analysis in a comparison of two information ethics approaches, namely those outlined by Rafael Capurro and Luciano Floridi It then develops, based on these foundations, analyses of the information ethical dimensions of two important areas of social media: one concerns the framing of social media by a surveillance-industrial complex in the context of Edward Snowden’s revelations and the other deals with issues of digital labour processes and issues of class that arises in this context The contribution asks ethical questions about these two phenomena that bring up issues of power, exploitation, and control in the information age It asks if, and if so, how, the approaches of Capurro and Floridi can help us to understand ethico-political aspects of the surveillance-industrial complex and digital labour.