Ethics in Business - GRP

Ethics in Business : Employer compliance with the Patriot Act

The United States Congress passed the Patriot Act on the 26th of October 2001 . This was about 6 weeks after the September 11 terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center . The bill was passed with little debate at the height of the anthrax contamination scare when many lawmakers did not have access to their offices . Sen Russell Feingold (D-WI , the lone dissenter in the Senate , remarked that few had even read summaries , let alone the fine print (http /www .libraryjournal .com

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There has been a lot of heated Public response on this issue . Those who support the Patriot Act are of the opinion that public safety requires granting the government greater surveillance powers

According to a survey carried out by the CSO Magazine in 2002 , 45 of about 800 companies surveyed , have supplied customer employee , or business partner data to the government (Holmes , 2007 Many of these accounts involve companies simply complying with court s . In fact , both Sarbox and the Patriot Act contain language which protects companies that hand over customer data by subpoena or court . The problem arises when companies hand over this information voluntarily . According to the CSO findings , ever since September 11th businesses have been voluntarily giving large databases of customer information to federal agencies . The law does not protect businesses who hand over information without a subpoena or court , thus leaving them open to litigation (Holmes , 2007

By inference , this practice of giving up information to the government voluntarily will almost always violate the privacy policies of these organizations

References

Holmes , A (2007 , April 14 . The Complying Game . CIO , pp . 40-48

http /www .libraryjournal .com /index .asp ?layout article articleid CA24504 4 publication libraryjournal

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