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Top1. Introduction
The novel networking paradigm of the Internet of Things (IoT) proposes to connect virtually all things in the physical world to the global Internet. The idea is to embed communication and processing abilities in ordinary objects to gather relevant data from their environment, send it to cloud for processing and ultimately provide smart end user services. IoT smart services encompass a gamut of application domains such as smart healthcare, smart transportation systems, smart grid, industrial automation, smart buildings, environmental monitoring, smart homes, smart city etc (Al-Fuqaha et al., 2015). The advanced services offered by IoT are poised to revolutionise the modern society. With a staggering market share of $ 2.7 trillion to $ 6.2 trillion by 2025 (Manyika et al., 2013), strategic importance of IoT vision is evident and such academia and industry are working closely to realise the dream.
Sensors embedded in everyday things, devices, gadgets, smart phones, buildings, roads etc. would have the ability to gather gigantic amounts of personal, organisational and strategic state data. For example, smart cars, smart TVs, smart phones, smart beds etc. may gather large volume of household information that is highly private and sensitive in nature. While collection of certain data may be necessary to provide smart applications, not all trifling details need to be sensed. Unbridled collection of data raises concerns about how the data is used or shared with other applications and devices. Very often there are reports of hacked IoT devices, smart cars, and IoT botnet attacks (Botnets: The Dangerous Side Effects Of The Internet Of Things, 2017; “How the Internet of Things Took Down the Internet,” 2016; “Millions of Volkswagens Can Be Unlocked by Hackers,” 2016; “Police drone can be hacked with $40 kit, says researcher,” 2016; “Security Experts Warn Congress That the Internet of Things Could Kill People,” 2016). The situation is particularly alarming given the revelation by Hewlett-Packard that 70 percent of IoT products are insecure (Hewlett-Packard, 2015). Since the concerns about security aspects of IoT are relatively well known (Abi Sen et al., 2018; Alaba et al., 2017; Granjal et al., 2015; HaddadPajouh et al., 2019; Kouicem et al., 2018; Mendez Mena et al., 2018; Tayyaba et al., 2020; Van Oorschot & Smith, 2019), this paper focuses only on the dimension of ethics that remains largely unexplored.
By utilising an array of smart things that are able to sense information of interest and utilise Artificial Intelligence (AI) to provide a variety of application services, the decisions involved in IoT may have ethical connotations (Hutson, 2017). For instance, smart devices could sense surroundings and exchange data with other devices or people that may be ethically unacceptable. Soon, service robots will be taking care of the elderly in their homes, controlling electrical supplies, driving trains and military robots will have their own targeting and firing protocols. As robots take on more and more responsibility, they must be programmed with moral decision-making abilities, for our own safety. In their seminal work (Wallach & Allen, 2009), the authors present a deep analysis of the latest thinking about philosophical ethics and artificial intelligence, and argue that although design of full-fledged moral agency may not be round the corner, it is already necessary to begin design of some basic ethical sensitivity within machines. Motivated by such thoughts, we seek to address the question of ethics design for smart things of IoT.