THE NATIONAL ACADEMY OF ENGINEERING

Computers and New Technology Cases and Scenarios

• Numerical & Design Problems With Ethical Content
  These 17 assignable problems were originally developed as part of an NSF-funded project to create numerical problems that raise ethical issues for use in engineering and other course assignments. They are technical problems that apply to a number of engineering disciplines.

• The David LaMacchia Case
  This is an annotated list of links to articles, legal documents, and newsgroup postings pertaining to the software piracy case of David LaMacchia, an MIT student who allegedly used university hardware to distribute commercial software over the Internet, which raises important issues about the liability of system operators and the scope of computer crime and copyright laws.

• Case of the Killer Robot
  A synopsis and index of the documents in the Case of the Killer Robot, a detailed hypothetical scenario that combines elements of software engineering and computer ethics. The case consists of several FICTIONAL newspaper articles.

• Sample Scenarios on Issues Surrounding Internet Privacy
  6 scenarios that discuss computers and Internet privacy, sampled from publications of the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board (CSTB) and the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).

• An Investigation of the Therac-25 Accidents
  Abstract of a 1993 article from IEEE Computer about the Therac-25 computerized radiation therapy machine and its software flaws, which caused massive overdoses to patients.

• Online Cases about Computers and Software
  An index of cases maintained by others.

• Legal Records Scenario
  This scenario by Michael C. Loui explores the ethical issues involved in the electronic monitoring of the secretarial staff's email.

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