Computer Ethics Pioneer Makes A World Of Difference

Europe's first professor of computer ethics has been awarded an international honour for making a difference to worldwide consideration of the ethical and social impacts of computing.

Prof Simon Rogerson is the Director of the Centre for Computing and Social Responsibility (CCSR) at De Montfort University and has been given the international ACM SIGCAS 2005 "Making A Difference" Award.

The award was announced at the international ETHICOMP 2005 conference at Linkoping University, Sweden, organised by CCSR last week.

The citation for Professor Rogerson's award said: "In the United Kingdom and the United States, in the European Union and in Russia, in New Zealand and Australia, Simon Rogerson has advanced the cause of computing and social responsibility."

"On several continents, scholars, students, computing professionals, government officials, and the public think differently about their world and their work because of Simon Rogerson. Clearly, Prof. Rogerson has made and continues to make a world-wide difference in how people view the complex interactions of computers and society."

Prof Rogerson has won a string of other awards: he was named a Fellow of the British Computer Society in 2004; declared one of the world's top computer ethics experts at the World Technology Awards in 2003; and received the 1999 IFIP Namur Award for his work on the social implications of information technology.

Professor Rogerson said "I am delighted to receive this prestigious award and honoured to be associated with the previous recipients all of whom I hold in such high regard. In many ways this award is a reflection of the international community that has grown over the last ten years and done so much to make the ETHICOMP conference series the premier European event in this field."

Prof Rogerson conceived the ETHICOMP conference series in 1995, and remains its co-director with Professor Terry Bynum. ETHICOMP conferences have been held in the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Greece and Sweden.

Prof Rogerson was also instrumental in launching the peer-review Journal of Information, Communication and Ethics in Society, and the CCSR's own web site is a leading portal dedicated to the social and ethical implications of information and communication technologies. The site holds over 1500 pages of resources, and annually receives over 4 million external visits.

He has also made an impact in terms of codes of ethics for software engineers. He was one of three members of the executive committee at the centre of the development of the Software Engineering Code of Ethics and Professional Practice, a code adopted by both the ACM and the IEEE Computer Society.

As a member of the Ethics Panel of Experts of the British Computer Society, he led the effort to revise their Code of Practice. Prof. Rogerson was also instrumental in updating the Code of Ethics of the Institute for the Management of Information Systems.

Prof Rogerson has published extensively in books and journals, consulting widely with governments and corporations. He has also helped create a software tool that helps computing professionals to more carefully consider the detailed societal implications of software development projects.

ENDS

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