Matters of Business Law and Business Ethics Tiffany A. Stephens Southern New Hampshire University BUS-206-R3557 Business Law I 23EW3 Prof. Brenna Strype February 5, 2023
Introduction As a sole proprietor, decisions and implications of business practice ultimately will fall solely on the owner. Because of this, it is of utmost importance to understand what ethical and legal obligations are in place when an issue arises. First, we will look at the ethical side of things. Ethics can be defined as "the study and practice of decisions about what is good or right" (Kubasek et al., 2019). From an ethical standpoint, you'll want your business to participate in activities deemed right in a consensus. We know we want to do the right thing, but how does that compare to what the law requires us to do? Ethical standards and laws are not always parallel, as some practices can be completely legal while not being ethical. To determine what your legal responsibility is, a look into your state code is necessary. States outline laws that determine the actions a business must take in these instances. Your state code may not require that you notify individuals whose data was part of the breach, but that does not mean you do not have an ethical obligation to do so. A good thing to keep in mind when trying to make an ethical decision is to ask yourself how you would want the situation handled if it were happening to you. Another aspect that will need to be addressed is your corporate social responsibility. This term refers to how "the community often expects firms to do much more for it than just provide a useful good or service at a reasonable price" (Kubasek et al., 2019). Corporate social responsibility is often more closely related to what a business should do ethically, despite the minimum the law may require. This awareness will help in determining your ethical obligations that the community you serve will find to be an appropriate course of action. Analysis The issue at hand is a data breach of information from customers who have purchased items from Mountain Top View online during the first quarter of the year. The code that led to
the breach was quickly corrected by IT Steve, and a limited amount of information from each customer was compromised. However, as the owner of Mountain Top View, you (Clare), were not notified of this breach until after the resolution of the breached code, and neither was Carlos, who oversees online operations. Because Mountain Top View is a sole proprietorship, any implications from this breach, no matter how minimal, would ultimately fall on the owner. The ethical dilemma begins with whether Steve should have informed you or not and ends with the question of whether to notify the parties involved. Because customer information is protected information, this also becomes a question of legality and what the law maintains you must do as the owner of Mountain Top View. Recommendation The decisions