News on the International Conference 'Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiry 2019', 28–30 May, in Norfolk, Virginia, US
CEPE (Computer Ethics—Philosophical Enquiry) 2019 is organized by the International Society for Ethics and Information Technology (INSEIT), directed by Maria Bottis, Associate Professor of Information Law, DALMS, Ionian University with the collaboration of the Ionian University Research Team IHRC (Information: History, Regulation and Culture). Maria Bottis is also Paper Co-Chair of CEPE 2019 and member of the Conference Committee.
CEPE is a leading international conference and has played a significant role in defining the field since its first event in 1997. CEPE is held biennially and is organized by INSEIT. CEPE 2009 took place at the Ionian University.
For CEPE 2019, the conference theme is Risk and Cybersecurity. Cybersecurity is of pressing and ever-expanding importance to governments, organizations, and individuals as ever more of our lives becomes digitally rendered, analyzed, manipulated, and stored. Even as cybersecurity issues present threats to us both individually and collectively, cybersecuritization—the political action of consolidating power and control through rhetorics of “cybersecurity”—threatens people and peoples in different ways.
Risk is central to computer ethics in numerous other ways as well. Risk abounds online as we figure out how to negotiate and protect identities that are increasingly visible across many parts of our lives, to persons but to companies and algorithms as well. Risk has always been central to engineering ethics, and computer ethics continues to negotiate shifting boundaries of the morality of whistleblowing along with changes in the economic, social, legal, and human costs of a hacked database. These issues are complicated further by innovations in robotics and the internet of things, which spread risk across what once was an online/offline boundary and into the smallest cracks of our lives, from military and domestic robots, to smart cities and smart homes, and to the digital assistants and baby monitors in our kitchens and bedrooms.
CEPE 2019 attracted 101 abstracts from all over the world. CEPE 2019 keynote speaker is Professor Deborah Johnson, University of Virginia.
At the conference, the next Weizenbaum award for excellence in computer ethics will be awarded, the decision of the recipient due in January 2019. The Weizenbaum award is given every two years by INSEIT's adjudication committee to an individual who has “made a significant contribution to the field of information and computer ethics, through his or her research, service, and vision.”Past recipients include James Moor (2017), Deborah Johnson (2015), Luciano Floridi (2013), Keith Miller (2011), Donald Gotterbarn (2010) and Terrel Ward Bynum, 2009, who received his Weizenbaum award at the Ionian Academy, Ionian University, local host of CEPE 2009 in Corfu.
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