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1.6 Ethical, legal, cultural and environmental impacts

5 dot points across 5 inquiry questions. Click any dot point for a focused answer with worked past exam questions where available.

How does digital technology change society, and who gets left behind?

The cultural impacts of digital technology: the digital divide, changes to work and jobs through automation, the effect of social media and the internet on behaviour and society, and issues of access and inclusion.
An OCR J277 1.6.1 answer on the cultural impacts of digital technology: the digital divide and unequal access, automation and the changing job market, the effects of social media and the internet on society, and issues of inclusion.
9 min answer →

What effect does the manufacture, use and disposal of digital technology have on the environment?

The environmental impacts of digital technology: the energy used in manufacture and operation, the raw materials and rare metals consumed, electronic waste and its disposal, and ways the impact can be reduced.
An OCR J277 1.6.1 answer on the environmental impacts of digital technology: energy use in manufacture and operation, the raw materials and rare metals consumed, electronic waste (e-waste) and its disposal, and how the impact can be reduced.
9 min answer →

How do you analyse the impact of a piece of digital technology on the people and groups it affects?

How to investigate and discuss computer science technologies while considering ethical, legal, cultural, environmental and privacy issues, and how to identify the stakeholders affected by a given technology.
An OCR J277 1.6.1 answer on how to investigate a digital technology against the five impact categories (ethical, legal, cultural, environmental and privacy), how to identify the stakeholders affected, and how to structure a balanced extended-response answer.
10 min answer →

Which laws govern the use of computers and data, and what does each one cover?

Legislation relevant to computer science: the Data Protection Act 2018, the Computer Misuse Act 1990, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, and software licensing (open source versus proprietary).
An OCR J277 1.6.1 answer on the key computing laws: the Data Protection Act 2018, the Computer Misuse Act 1990 and its three offences, the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, and the difference between open source and proprietary software licensing.
11 min answer →

What privacy issues does the collection and use of personal data create?

The privacy issues raised by digital technology: what personal data is, how it is collected and used by organisations and websites, the risks to individuals, and the tension between convenience, security and privacy.
An OCR J277 1.6.1 answer on the privacy issues digital technology raises: what counts as personal data, how organisations and websites collect and use it, the risks to individuals, and the trade-off between convenience and privacy.
10 min answer →