Information Ethics in the Information Age

Abstract

Information ethics (IE) is a field of fundamental and applied study that lacks the firm foundation of a definition of information. The at times ethereal, at times pervasive nature of information contributes to the elusiveness of a definition. Paradoxically, everyone seems to recognise information when they see it, but there is great difficulty in arriving at a common perspective. This is partly due to its wide-ranging applicability in many and disparate fields of knowledge, e.g., business, finance, media communications, physics, biology, computer science, engineering, library science, to name a few. All of which share the commonality of dealing with digital information and communication technologies (ICTs) which seem to be the trigger for issues in IE. The purpose of this paper is to suggest the definition of information by Bateson as a basis to seek a fundamental and applied understanding in IE.