Through reading this book, we learned that there are a lot of issues involved with computing that people do not realize or think about. These issues include privacy, censorship, ethics/computer crime, testing, and copyright violations. We are now more fully aware of the implications of using computing technology, both positive and negative.

We learned that through computers, people have a lot less privacy than they think. Information about them can be sold or given away without their knowledge or authorization and used inappropriately. Credit card numbers can easily be stolen and used. Even the government has used information in private databases inappropriately. There is no guarantee that any information people provide will be held confidential, which reduces people's faith in supplying this information. Maybe the movie, The Net, is not so far-fetched.

Censorship has always been a big issue in the United States. Computers cannot be blamed for problems of lack of censorship of pornography and bomb-building instructions since they have always been available to the public. Computers simply add a new medium for obtaining them. Parents should be responsible to control their childrens' access to the Internet and to these sites, instead of wanting other people to take care of their children for them.

We feel that some people are always going to be dishonest, and computers just add a new medium for crime. Just like guns cannot be blamed for killing people, computers cannot be blamed for crimes committed by using them. With every new change in technology, there must be new laws to govern its usage and to punish those who use it unethically. At the same time, computing technology and security features cannot prevent crime.

We were shocked by the lack of testing some programs go through before hitting the market, just so that the companies can get a competitive advantage. The Therac-25 machine was not tested properly and was considered safer than earlier models, even though it did not contain the safety features independent of computers, characteristic of the older models. Consequently, people were killed and seriously injured. Compromising health and safety to earn a few more dollars is ridiculous and unethical. Also, had the NASA officials not played down the risks of launching the Challenger, lives could have been saved. They took a gamble, and lost.

Copyright and patent laws need to be strict because people spend months or years, and sometimes millions of dollars working on a new product or invention and they thus need protection for their investments; otherwise, people would not want to spend the time and effort to create it. Infringement on copyrights and patents cost billions of dollars a year and the companies who are losing these billions of dollars are going to make up those losses by raising prices, hurting society as a whole. However, copyrighting cannot be effectively enforced on the Internet. Who has not downloaded an image or two from a site? It is just too easy.

Thus computers are not as wonderful as people make them out to be. Privacy and safety are compromised and copyrights are abused; even the goverment is guilty of these activities.