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Defining Objectives for Preventing Cyberstalking

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Abstract

Cyberstalking is a significant challenge in the era of Internet and technology. When dealing with cyberstalking, institutions and governments struggle in how to manage it and where to allocate resources. Therefore, it is important to understand how individuals feel about the problem of cyberstalking and how it can be managed. In this paper, we use Nissenbaum’s (Wash L Rev 79(1):119–158, 2004) contextual integrity as a theoretical framework for applying Keeney’s (Manag Sci 45: 533–542, 1999) value-focused thinking technique to develop actionable objectives aimed at the prevention of cyberstalking. By systematically interviewing over 100 individuals, we extract 20 objectives based on the underlying norms of distribution and appropriateness relevant to the context of cyberstalking. The objectives ensure that contextual integrity is maintained and cyberstalking prevented. Organizations can benefit from the objectives developed in this research since they are a means for developing an ethical policy regarding cyberstalking. Therefore, they help to ensure an ethical engagement with society at large by organizations when dealing with cyberstalking. Researchers can use these objectives to explore the best means for their implementation by organizations and institutions. Additionally they can explore the network mapping of fundamental and means objectives to determine relationships and their strengths in the cyberstalking context.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Information Systems Department, Virginia Commonwealth University, 301 W Main St, Richmond, VA, 23220, USA

    Kane J. Smith

  2. Department of Information Systems and Supply Chain Management, University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 479 Bryan Building, Greensboro, NC, 27402, USA

    Gurpreet Dhillon

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  1. Gurpreet Dhillon
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  2. Kane J. Smith
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Correspondence to Kane J. Smith.

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All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki Declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Dhillon, G., Smith, K.J. Defining Objectives for Preventing Cyberstalking. J Bus Ethics 157, 137–158 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-017-3697-x

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