
(US) Suicide Hotline Left Ethics Board Out Of The Loop About Data-Sharing With For-Profit Spinoff – Forbes (Alexandra S. Levine | February 2022)
Crisis Text Line was an important service with an admirable mission. It was worthy of the support it received from the tech sector. But it is no surprise that ethical questions have been raised about the personal data shared with the commercial spin-off, Loris. The arguments are: 1. The data does not contain personal identifiers. 2. They shared their plans in 2018. 3. Their privacy statement disclosed that there would be sharing. But the matters raise the questions: (i) Does consent have a spirit that extends beyond a legal contract? (ii) Can an activity be ethical (as defined in ethics standards) and legal (as defined in privacy legislation) but still be in bad faith with participants?