An ethical analysis of the 2016 data scandal: Cambridge Analytica and Facebook

This paper analyzes the ethics behind the actions of the 2016 Data Scandal on the example of 2 major sides, Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. Subsequent events such as bankruptcy of Cambridge Analytica and a significant drop in the stock prices of Facebook (a fall of 24%, equivalent to $134 billion.) were an integral part of this research paper to explore the role of the attitudes of the business entities over bankruptcy in these kinds of scandals. Thereby, a comparison technique has been employed to analyze the ethical dimension of the bankruptcy of Cambridge Analytica, and how the attitude of Facebook provided a chance of survival and recovery within this process. The outcome of the research clearly identifies that even in the corporative entities bypassing or violating the ethical standards can be observed. Albeit, there is a strong correlation between the degree of ethical standards and the sustainability of the businesses from the aspect of customers, partners, and the government. The article continued with the analysis of the significance of the immediate implementation of the ethical standards and deterrent defense with a manner of “bona fide” in these types of scandals to handle the crisis. The research concluded with an ethical analysis of data analysis and data mining from the Kantian definition of autonomy, Jurgen Habermas’s definition of privacy in the era of digitalization.