Ethical Issues in Cryptography and Information Security: Concerns for Digital Libraries

Cryptography has widely been used as a means of information security in today’s electronic world. In addition to e-commerce, e-mail and other applications over the Internet, it has been used in common household items as well. The increased reliance on cryptographic methods has raised several ethical questions of global concern that are closely related to fundamental human rights. Some view it as a boon, as an escape from the oppressive hands of the state while others see it as a way of making the information poor have to pay for every information and denial of access to essential information. In this paper an attempt has been made to separate out the concepts appropriate to each interpretation. Digital libraries also face quite many ethical problems concerning cryptography that even stand against the principles of a public library system. The problems are related to inequality of access, intellectual property and copyright issues.