Ethics and the Internet of Things (IoT): How Ethical Principles are Communicated between law, academia and the development of the IoT.

Abstract: As the Internet of Things (IoT) becomes more and more prevalent, there are growing concerns of how it will affect our lives. With its capabilities to record large amounts of data, it carries large risks to personal privacy and the protection of our personal data. The opacity of IoT also makes it hard to know exactly what data is being collected and how it is protected, as such transparency and security are also major concerns. Legislation such as GDPR are meant to protect these ethical principles. At the same time a lot of research is being done both pertaining to the risks as well as proposed solutions. However, it remains unclear if the legal system and the academic system are able to communicate these principles to the people developing IoT. With Niklas Luhmann’s systems theory as a theoretical backdrop, this thesis is using semi-structured interviews to explore the way these ethical principles are communicated between the system of IoT development, the legal system and the academic system. Finding that there are issues with how they are communicated between the system as well as how the differences in the binary code of the different systems causes friction when the principles are to be translate from one system to another. While the legal system can communicate its ideas the academic system fairs much worse. In the end, the communication needs to match the binary code of the system of IoT development for successful communication to occur.