peter
Business Reporter
ZIMBABWE is tightening its policies and laws to support the growing digital economy while tackling data breaches to improve smooth public and private sector online operations.
Postal and Telecommunications Regulatory Authority of Zimbabwe (Potraz) director general, Dr Gift Machengete, told the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) 2020 on Tuesday that Zimbabwe was keeping abreast with global technological advancement including adoption of policies to curb cyber abuses and enhancing ethical conduct in the digital sphere.
Zimbabwe has had its fair share of information and knowledge dissemination and associated ethical problems. Just as other parts of the world have grappled with hacking, Government systems in Zimbabwe, as well as banking system have been targeted.
Some locals have been lured into pyramid schemes, or fallen victim to phishing and identity theft and, have had their computer systems compromised. While privacy data breaches in Zimbabwe have not been as spectacular, Dr Machengete said the country remains vigilant to protect unsuspecting citizens.
“Zimbabwe has come up with policies that encourage both the public and private sector to secure their computer systems and websites. The local banks have robust firewall systems to ensure safe transactions,” he said.
“Laws in place include copy right and intellectual property laws. The right to privacy is enshrined in the constitution, while confidentiality contracts are the norm in inter-company transactions and consultancy arrangements, as well as cross border transactions. A new cybersecurity and data protection Bill, is due to become law soon, to enhance the existing laws.”
Dr Machengete’s presentations sought to unpack how a knowledge society can manage the ethical dimensions that come into play when generating, sharing and making available, knowledge that may be used to improve human development and what has been the Zimbabwean experience? With the digital footprint expanding across the entire life under the banner of “Internet of Things”, Dr Machengete said the increasing interconnectedness has not eliminated the ethics relating to information, but increased ethical concerns in various dimensions.
“Identification of the relevant ethics and their various facets, is critical for knowledge societies to deal with the issues involved,” he said.
The Potraz director general stressed the need to effectively deal with ethical issues that may arise by identifying the dimensions and coming up with measures to manage them.
“This includes coming up with sanctions for unethical behaviour. He said the basic principles of ethics that include integrity and accuracy of information, privacy and confidentiality, copyright and plagiarism, security and, intellectual property, must be dealt with at corporate, individual and Government levels. There is also a need to consider the implications of Internet of things, where intelligent gadgets make decisions that may require moral considerations to be taken into account, said Dr Machengete.
“No doubt that we all have the ethical duty to protect the minds of children to ensure that what they consume is morally sound and does not damage them to an extent that makes them adopt unethical ideas and behaviours portrayed in the material shared with them. In this regard, Zimbabwe commends ITU for its recently Published Child online Protection Guidelines,” said Dr Machengete.
He said the country’s laws compliment the moral norms that are ingrained in every Zimbabwean, that of Ubuntu (the nature of our personality). He said this concept was promoted continuously by Government and Potraz in the quest to achieve the ethical target of bridging the digital divide, to ensure that every citizen joins the information highway and participates as a full member of our knowledge society.
Online Reporter