Topic 5: Issues and impact Flashcards
How does Manufacturing digital devices affect the environment?
- Large quantities of raw materials are needed. Some non-renewable and some highly toxic
- Mining for raw materials damages wildlife habitats
- Energy used in manufacturing process comes from non-renewable fossil fuels, which contributes to global warming
How does the disposal of digital devices affect the environment?
- Discarded devices end up as e-waste
- E-waste may be illegally dumped in landfill sites, where toxic substances can get into land and water
- Many computers components cannot be recycled
- Millions of tonnes of e-waste are dumped into developing countries
Describe the energy consumption of a digital device
Energy is consumed in:
- producing computer equipment
- functioning of equipment
- online data storage in data centres
- recycling of equipment
Responsible recycling advantages
- reduce chemical leakage / fires in landfills
- enable the recovery of valuable metals
- reduce need for mining
- enable the recycling of plastic cases
- reduce amount of harmful toxins released into the air
How manufacturers contribute to the short replacement cycle
- use embedded batteries, making difficult to replace them
- gluing components to make repair difficult
- inflating price of spare parts, to make repair expensive
- only providing software updates for a limited time
Consequences of short replacement cycle
- It adds to e-waste, as more devices are thrown away
- More devices must be manufactured
Responsible ownership
- keeping devices for longer
- buying a pre-owned device
- donating unwanted devices
- using energy-efficiency measures
- reducing internet usage
Ways to reduce energy consumption
- Adjust energy settings into ‘sleep’ mode
- Switch off Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and GPS when not using
- Close dormant applications
- Disconnect peripherals
- Choosing devices with high energy-efficiency rate
Positive impact
- Intelligent traffic control systems keep traffic moving reducing fuel consumption
- ‘Smart lighting’ switches off lights when they are not needed
- Using imnternet to work from home reduces burning of fossil fuels which reduces greenhouse gases
What is digital footprint?
the trail of personal data left behind each time someone uses the internet
Benefits of collecting personal data
- Personalisation: offers can be directed to an individuals preferences
- Convenience: personal details, such as credit card numbers and addresses, only need to be entered once
Drawbacks of collecting personal data
- Privacy: not obvious who is collecting data and who they are passing it to
- Security: data breaches occur frequently
- Discrimination: analysis of shared data could discriminate people
- Civil liberties: analysis of shared data by police forces could wrongly associate innocent people with criminal behaviour
Ethical issues of owning data:
- When posting a foto, IP is retained, but company can do what they want do with the photo
- Medical records in the UK, belong to National Health Service, and patients only have right to view them.
- User will always own their names and addresses, but not clear who owns data about their activity
- Online retailers sell shoppers’ purchase data to other retailers. Google sells people’s search histories.
Data protection act 2018 (7 principles)
- Must have a reason for processing person’s data
- Only use the data for the specific purpose
- Only collect as much data as is necessary
- Ensure that the data they collect is accurate and current
- Not keep data for longer than necessary
- keep data secure and protect it against loss or damage
- Demonstrate that their data protection measures are adequate
The DPA gives data subjects (persons whose data is stored) the right to:
- be informed about the collection of their data
- access their data
- have inaccurate data corrected
- have data erased
- object to how their data is processed
- withdraw consent at any time
- restrict the way in which their data is processed
- obtain and reuse their data for their own purposes
- complain to the Information Commissioner
Computer Misuse Act 1990
was used to prosecute cyber criminals in the UK.
The computer misuse act identifies 3 offences:
- Unauthorised acces to computer material (logging into another person’s computer)
- Unauthorised acces eith intent to commint further offences (stealing sombody’s credit card and using it for another crime)
- Unauthorised access with intent to impair the running of a computer or to damage or destroy data (planting a virus)
Cookies
is a small text file that is downloaded onto a user’s computer when they visit a website. Enables website recognise and store users preferences.
Benefit of accepting cookies
Saves time, because enables the website to store customers preference, delivery details, etc. so that the customer only has to supply this information once
Aritficial intelligence
computer systems capable of performing tasks that typyically require human intelligence such as: pattern recognition, problem solving and decision making
Machine learning
is a subset of AI, the algorithm learns by looking for rules and patterns in real-time data. They get progressively better, without having specific rules
Narrow AI
a type of AI that cannot perform multiple tasks, they are able only to perform one specific task
Examples of narrow AI
- email spam detctors
- facial and finger print recognition systems
- voice recognition in digital assistants
- self driving cars
- content recomendations
Algorithmic bias
is when an algorithm is biased and perjudices or discriminates certain individuals.
Reasons why algorithmic bias occurs
- Dataset used to train the AI system is itself biased
- there is a design flaw in the AI algorithm causing it to exaggerate bias
- the developers who design and build AI systems unintentionally incorporate their own prejudices and preconceptions into them
Who is responsible when an AI system goes wrong?
Could be:
- the creator of the algorithm
- the supplier of the data
- the user of the algorithm
What does copyright protect?
Novels, textbooks computer programs, images, films, music recordings
How long lasts copyright?
lasts for 70 years after the death of the copyright holder
Patents
- Protect new inventions, both what they do and how they work.
- protection is not automatic as copyright
- applicant has to demonstrate that their invention is different from anything else that exists.
- a patent holder has 20 years to use and sell the invention