Unit 3 Unit 7

Unit 5 - Interviews, Survey Methods, and Questionnaire Design

Reflection: Ethical Implications of Misused Surveys in Data Collection

The Cambridge Analytica scandal (2018) represents one of the most prominent cases of survey misuse in recent history. The company harvested data from millions of Facebook users through seemingly benign personality quizzes. Although only around 270,000 users directly engaged with the survey, the application exploited Facebook's data-sharing permissions to access the information of approximately 87 million users (Confessore, 2018). This data was then allegedly used to develop psychographic profiles for targeted political advertising in the UK’s Brexit referendum and the 2016 US presidential election.

This case exemplifies how informed consent can be undermined by opaque platform policies and deceptive data collection methods. From an ethical standpoint, the primary violation lies in the lack of transparency and informed user participation—key principles in ethical research and professional computing practice. The British Computer Society (BCS) Code of Conduct and ACM Code of Ethics both emphasise user autonomy, privacy, and accountability, which were demonstrably breached in this instance.

A further example is the Google Street View Wi-Fi data collection controversy (2010). Google’s Street View cars, while collecting images for maps, also intercepted private Wi-Fi data including emails and passwords. Though unintentional according to the company, the breach revealed how technical overreach and inadequate internal controls can lead to severe legal and regulatory consequences—including investigations by data protection authorities in several countries.

Both cases reflect broader social consequences, particularly public distrust in digital platforms and the erosion of confidence in online consent mechanisms. Legally, they prompted stricter data regulations, including the enforcement of the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in 2018, which codifies principles of data minimisation, purpose limitation, and consent.

From a professional standpoint, these incidents underscore the responsibility of developers, data scientists, and platform designers to ensure that survey-based tools are not only technically robust but also ethically defensible. It is imperative to integrate privacy-by-design principles into digital systems and to maintain a strong ethical culture within organisations that handle user data.

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