Toward an Ethical Framework for Smart Cities and the Internet of Things

As smart cities increasingly become real, an ethical framework for them becomes increasingly necessary. Surprisingly, current approaches largely disregard such a framework and concentrate primarily on challenges pertaining to the data lifecycle. However, a smart city involves much more than data gathering: it involves the interactions of residents, businesses, and government agencies with respect to public and private resources subject to potentially subtle regulations and other norms. This article introduces a sociotechnical view of smart cities and shows how it may be profitably mapped to the moral foundation theory to provide a comprehensive ethical framework.