Information Technology Ethics Volkswagen Emission Scandal †Free Sampl

Question: Discuss about the Information Technology Ethics Volkswagen. Answer: Volkswagen Emission Scandal In September 2015, the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) found during some tests that Volkswagen company was constantly cheating the American customers. In the cars to be sold in America, they used to install a software named defeat device that was able to detect when the cars were being tested. Accordingly, this software auto-adjusted the settings in such a way that the testers got false reading from the car. As a result, the testers got wrong emission readings from the car. Hence, the people got the wrong impressions about the emissions from the cars (Krall Peng, 2015). The main part of Volkswagens marketing strategy was that they said their cars were of very low emissions. This strategy worked as the sales were boosted in America. However, after the results were made public, Volkswagen were accused of cheating the American clients by lying about the low emission cars. As a result, sales of Volkswagen cars were immediately reduced significantly resulting in significant losses for the company. Sometime in 2014, US environmental emission control officials reported that the Volkswagen cars were emitting high amount of toxic gases than usual. However, the claims in these reports were denied by Volkswagen authority who said that some cars might have more emissions due to some technical issues or poor starting mechanism. For some time, the Volkswagen authority managed to divert the emission control officials from the issue. Moreover, whenever the Volkswagen cars were sent to test facilities for emission tests, no abnormal results were obtained. At that time, the emission test officials had no idea of such devices or softwares that forced the wrong emission output during the testing. However, the emission test devices at the test facilities were also outdated and failed to detect the use of the advanced devices that masked the actual emission from the car. Hence, Volkswagen continued to sell the cars with the defeat devices in USA resulting in generation of a huge amount of reve nue for the company. With the increase in the revenue, the pollution amount also increased significantly in US. However, in late 2015, the defeat devices were finally detected and the cheating mechanism was caught during the testing of a Volkswagen car. Defeat devices are some specially designed softwares that are able to detect when a car is being tested. When the test starts, this software automatically changes the settings of the car such that the emission is reduced significantly than usual. Hence, there is no way to detect the cheating mechanism unless the whole car is disassembled and tested. The ethical issue with this case was that the Volkswagen customers were getting cheated by the company without even knowing about such a defeat device. Moreover, there is a chance the car users may get arrested for using the defeat devices as there are no certain proofs of the installer. The implication is on the earths atmosphere and hence, this act of cheating is actually having a negat ive effect on the humanity on a whole. The cars produced high emissions whereas the test results could not detect them. As a result, the sales of the cars were increasing significantly and it in turn increased air pollution at an alarming rate. After the defeat device was detected, the Volkswagen authority stated that they would conduct an internal investigation to identify those who approved the use of such cheating devices. Moreover, the authority also stated they would also review 8.5 million cars all over Europe to check whether they contained the defeat devices as well or not. After the massive outage of the Volkswagen cars in USA, the prices of the cars fell by a third. As a result, the company encountered a loss of 2.5bn that is expected to increase as a result of the scandal. There are two options to solve the issue. First option is banning the company from selling any car for a certain period of time (e.g. 5 years) and the second option is implementing a testing procedure for testing the cars before dispatching them for delivery. The best option is implementation of the pre-dispatch testing procedure. The first option will stop the sales of the company and it may get bankrupt during this time. Moreover, existing us ers will not receive any servicing for their cars. Hence, implementation of the testing system is the best option and it will ensure no cheatwares or cheating softwares are used along with the car. References Barrett, S. R., Speth, R. L., Eastham, S. D., Dedoussi, I. C., Ashok, A., Malina, R., Keith, D. W. (2015). Impact of the Volkswagen emissions control defeat device on US public health.Environmental Research Letters,10(11), 114005. Blackwelder, B., Coleman, K., Colunga-Santoyo, S., Harrison, J. S., Wozniak, D. (2016). The Volkswagen Scandal. Burki, T. K. (2015). Diesel cars and health: the Volkswagen emissions scandal.The Lancet Respiratory Medicine,3(11), 838-839. Crte, R. (2016). The Volkswagen Scandal from the Viewpoint of Corporate Governance.Eur. J. Risk Reg.,7, 25. Ewing, J. (2015). Volkswagen says 11 million cars worldwide are affected in diesel deception.The New York Times,22. Hakim, D., Bradsher, K. (2015). After Volkswagen Revelation, Auto Emissions Tests Come Under Global Scrutiny.The New York Times (Sept 24, 2015). Available at: https://www. ny t imes. com/2015/09/25/business/international/vo lk swa gen-emi ssions-pollution-regulations. html. Krall, J. R., Peng, R. D. (2015). The Volkswagen scandal: Deception, driving and deaths.Significance,12(6), 12-15. Ragatz, J. A. (2015). What Can We Learn from the Volkswagen Scandal?.