The Ethics of Data Analytics, part 1

Towards a professional code of ethics for data mining
First in a series of meetings

Summary: The first in a series of meetings to collect insights and issues from the data mining and analytics community on a practical code of ethics for the profession

Panellists:
Tom Khabaza, Chairman of the Society of Data Miners
Hugh Lawson-Tancred, Ethics Co-ordinator for the Society of Data Miners
Hetan Shah, Executive Director of the Royal Statistical Society
Mariarosaria Taddeo, Researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, & Faculty Fellow at the Alan Turing Institute
Richard Beaumont, Product Manager at OneTrust

Location: Digital Catapult London, 101 Euston Road, London NW1 2RA (near Kings Cross / St Pancras)

Date & Time: 1:30-3:30 pm, Monday 5 December 2016

The Society of Data Miners is delighted to announce the first in a series of meetings for consultation and discussion on a proposed code of ethics for the data mining profession.

Data mining and data analysis now play an enormous role in social and economic life, but this has not been accompanied by appropriate reflection on the ethical responsibilities of practitioners. The Society of Data Miners will conduct a series of meetings to obtain a broad knowledge-base, to draft a code addressing the ethical issues which face the data analytics profession. The first of these meetings will take the form of a panel discussion, involving senior experts on issues of data ethics:

Hetan Shah is Executive Director of the Royal Statistical Society. He will talk about the wide range of ethical issues which emerge in the data science landscape, and argue that multiple mechanisms are needed to deal with this, including a Council for Data Ethics.

Mariarosaria Taddeo is a researcher at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, and Faculty Fellow at the Alan Turing Institute. Mariarosaria will focus on the relevance of Data Ethics to support the development and employment of data science for the good of society, including the ethics of data, the ethics of algorithms and the ethics of practice.

Richard Beaumont is Product Manager at OneTrust, providers of privacy management software to help businesses meet legal obligations for privacy and data protection. Richard will discuss questions such as: Just because you can, does it mean you should? Hugh Lawson-Tancred has worked on both the practical and theoretical side of data ethics. Hugh will concentrate on the issue of deanonymisation and the ethical cost of collecting, holding and analysing large datasets. Hugh will also summarise the work of the Society so far on drafting a code of ethics, and the proposed series of consultative meetings.

Tom Khabaza is the Chairman of the Society of Data Miners, and a data analytics practitioner of 25 year standing. Tom will chair the panel discussion, hoping to elicit a draft list of issues that the Society should address in its code of ethics.