Ethical Considerations

Ethical Issues

Janice Blanchard, MSPH, CSA went into some detail on her concerns about this passive monitoring technology at a workshop in the ASA/NCOA conference, many taken from an article she wrote for the CSA Journal (published by the Society of Certified Senior Advisors, December 2003). She and Harry R. Moody, PhD, who is on the board of Living Independently, debated the pros and cons of the surveillance of seniors using systems like these. Although they disagreed on many issues, both agreed that the primary concern was the potential loss of privacy to the person being monitored if not handled carefully.

Among other things, Blanchard was worried that some systems were installed after getting permission not from the elderly person being monitored, but from adult children. In some cases, she said, no one gave written permission for the installation of the systems. Clearly the person being monitored must give permission unless they are not mentally capable of giving such permission (and you have to wonder whether anyone too impaired to give permission should be living alone in the first place.) She emphasized the need to get written permission to install the system as well as explicit instructions about who pictures and other information can be shared with. In addition, she wants to allow the person being monitored to be able turn the system off themselves at any time, something that is not even possible with some systems.

Other concerns include:

  • TMI (too much information) -- will this affect the relationship of the parents and their children?
  • Failure to act -- what if someone is monitoring another and doesn't notice and act on a problem? Who is responsible when the information was available but not used?
  • False alarms -- just as we have learned to ignore car alarms because they so often go off needlessly, will we ignore important items if the system notifies us about many things that are not important?
  • Interception -- data from wireless cameras can be intercepted, and so can alert messages sent to cell phones.
  • What about visitors? They never gave permission to be monitored. Do they have to be notified they are under surveillance?

These passive monitoring systems may have merit, but users should be sure to keep the ethical issues under consideration!