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In Chapter 10 of our text, Ethics of the Information Age, author Michael J. Quinn discusses moral problems brought on by changes in the workplace as society continues to automate and integrate with technology. Initially, the Black Mirror episode that we are discussing, “Hated in the Nation”, does not seem like it would align with the chapter’s main ideas.
However, there is one key “character” that can be linked to this chapter – the Autonomous Drone Insects (ADIs).
Computer Reliability in Black Mirror: Hated in the Nation Chapter 8 covers the various way computer systems can be unreliable and the impacts these situations can have on humanity. In Black Mirror, there wasn’t a direct case where a software system failed but rather security issues. Yet what is interesting in the case presented by Black Mirror is that the failure of the Drone system is a result of both a rogue ex-employee and a mandatory back door installed by the government.
Crime in Black Mirror: Hated in the Nation In chapter 7 of the textbook, there is a section on hacking that contains a case study about the Firefox extension, Firesheep. The extension, launched in 2010, makes sidejacking easy, even for people without a technical understanding of what they are actually doing. Sidejacking is the act of hijacking an open web session by capturing the user’s cookie. This allows the sidejacker to perform actions on the website, while acting as the user.
Freedom of Speech in Black Mirror: Hated in the Nation The topic of Freedom of Speech is heavily critiqued in this episode of the British anthology series, Black Mirror. The crux of this episode revolves around a social media hashtag #deathto. The original intent of this hashtag was for every day users of this social media site to express their feelings towards a particular individual. This seems harmless at first - in the United States of America, the First Amendment protects the citizens’ right to freedom of speech.