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The Debate on the Moral Responsibilities of Online Service Providers

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Abstract

Online service providers (OSPs)—such as AOL, Facebook, Google, Microsoft, and Twitter—significantly shape the informational environment (infosphere) and influence users’ experiences and interactions within it. There is a general agreement on the centrality of OSPs in information societies, but little consensus about what principles should shape their moral responsibilities and practices. In this article, we analyse the main contributions to the debate on the moral responsibilities of OSPs. By endorsing the method of the levels of abstract (LoAs), we first analyse the moral responsibilities of OSPs in the web (LoAIN). These concern the management of online information, which includes information filtering, Internet censorship, the circulation of harmful content, and the implementation and fostering of human rights (including privacy). We then consider the moral responsibilities ascribed to OSPs on the web (LoAON) and focus on the existing legal regulation of access to users’ data. The overall analysis provides an overview of the current state of the debate and highlights two main results. First, topics related to OSPs’ public role—especially their gatekeeping function, their corporate social responsibilities, and their role in implementing and fostering human rights—have acquired increasing relevance in the specialised literature. Second, there is a lack of an ethical framework that can (a) define OSPs’ responsibilities, and (b) provide the fundamental sharable principles necessary to guide OSPs’ conduct within the multicultural and international context in which they operate. This article contributes to the ethical framework necessary to deal with (a) and (b) by endorsing a LoA enabling the definition of the responsibilities of OSPs with respect to the well-being of the infosphere and of the entities inhabiting it (LoAFor).

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Notes

  1. https://www.reformgovernmentsurveillance.com.

  2. http://ec.europa.eu/archives/commission_2010-2014/president/news/speeches-statements/pdf/deauville-g8-declaration_en.pdf.

  3. The reader interested in the methodology of the LoA may find useful the following books: (Heath et al. 1994; Diller 1994; Jacky 1997; Boca 2014). Philosophers interested in the concept of abstraction as used in this article may wish to see Hoare (1972).

  4. Dissemination and access to copyrighted material has also been a topic of great interest in research concerned with OSPs. However, this problem falls outside the scope of this article, for it has more to do with liability and the application of laws protecting copyright online than with the moral duties of OSPs. The interested reader may find useful the analyses of copyright online provided in Hanel (2006), Edwards (2011), Friedmann (2014).

  5. Other relevant contributions on the diversity of the sources and information available on the web have been provided in the literature in information and communication studies, law, and public policy. The interested reader may find useful the following articles: (Pandey et al. 2005; Pasquale 2006; Hargittai 2007; Van Couvering 2007; Diaz 2008; Hinman 2008; Lewandowski 2011).

  6. The reader interested in the transparency and the copyright of code will find interesting the following articles: (Reger 2004; Wolf et al. 2009).

  7. Concerns for the implication that filtering of information may have for participative democracy and the nature of the web have also been expressed in Lessig (1999).

  8. The issue arises as to whether OSPs should be ascribed moral responsibilities with respect to societies at large or solely with respect to societies depending on ICTs. The answer depends on the way such responsibilities are defined. For example, if one considers the protection of privacy a duty to respect human rights, then one could argue that OSPs bear this responsibility independently from the level of distribution of their services in a given region. One could also argue that societies where Internet is not pervasive will sooner or later become information societies and hence that, even if OSPs do not massively affect these societies, they will in the foreseeable future. We would like to thank one of the anonymous reviewers for pointing out this aspect.

  9. With the exception of countries like China and Thailand, where the strict liability model is endorsed and OSPs are liable for third-party content.

  10. For a critical analysis of the ‘safe harbour’ model see Pagallo (2011).

  11. An interesting analysis of OSPs’ legal responsibilities with respect to this has been provided in Burk (2011).

  12. A legal analysis of third-party liability under US tort law has been provided in Ziniti (2008).

  13. http://ec.europa.eu/health/tobacco/law/advertising/index_en.htm.

  14. http://articles.latimes.com/1999/dec/05/news/mn-40632.

  15. Internet censorship and freedom of speech have also been at the centre of a debate focusing on the balance between individual rights and state power. This topic does not fall within the scope of this article. The interested reader may find useful (Taddeo 2013, 2014).

  16. Resolution on “The Promotion, Protection and Enjoyment of Human Rights on the Internet” (Human Rights Council of the United Nations 2012).

  17. http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/enron/.

  18. https://m.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101974380267911.

  19. http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html.

  20. http://www.unesco.org/bpi/eng/unescopress/1999/99-92e.shtml.

  21. The document has been approved on August 13, 2003 by the United Nations Sub-Commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights. http://business-humanrights.org/en/united-nations-sub-commission-norms-on-business-human-rights-explanatory-materials.

  22. Governmental censorship has spread throughout the globe with the Internet; the literature on OSPs’ responsibilities in China casts an interesting light on a problem that concerns several other countries around the world (Aceto et al. 2015).

  23. https://m.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10101974380267911.

  24. For a review of the most relevant contributions of the debate on information privacy the reader may refer to Tavani and Moor (2001), Solove (2008), Smith et al. (2011).

  25. Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s CEO, declared in 2010 that privacy is not a social norm any more as “people have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people”. http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/jan/11/facebook-privacy.

  26. Research on privacy breaches occurring because of third-party access and of users’ habits have been provided in Brandimarte et al. (2013), Lampinen et al. (2011), Wang et al. (2011), Madden (2012), De Wolf et al. (2014).

  27. An example of such a friction is discussed in section “LOAON: OSPs’ Moral Responsibilities on the Web” with respect to the debate on the ‘right to be forgotten’.

  28. http://ec.europa.eu/justice/data-protection/files/factsheets/factsheet_data_protection_en.pdf.

  29. Julia Powles maintains an extensive bibliography online at http://www.cambridge-code.org/googlespain.html.

  30. Disclosure: one of the authors of this paper (L. F.) is a member of the Advisory Board.

  31. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/google/10967211/Google-is-the-judge-and-jury-in-the-right-to-be-forgotten.html.

  32. https://www.reformgovernmentsurveillance.com.

  33. Net neutrality also refers to responsibilities on the web. However, this problem concerns the backbone infrastructure of the web and hence it involves Internet Service Providers more than Online Service Providers. The interested reader may find useful the following articles: (Blumenthal 2001; Lessig 2007; Schahczenski 2008; Turilli et al. 2012).

  34. Article 29 Data Protection Working Party, “Opinion 03/2013 on purpose limitation”, p. 4.

  35. This is a free choice in which only one option is offered, so it is really equivalent to a ‘take it or leave it’ choice.

  36. A brief description of the history of the definition of international guidelines for the protection of privacy has been provided in Gerry and Berova (2014), Kiss and Szőke (2015).

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  1. Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, 1, St Giles, Oxford, OX1 3JS, UK

    Mariarosaria Taddeo & Luciano Floridi

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  1. Mariarosaria Taddeo
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  2. Luciano Floridi
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Taddeo, M., Floridi, L. The Debate on the Moral Responsibilities of Online Service Providers. Sci Eng Ethics 22, 1575–1603 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11948-015-9734-1

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