A Set of Principles for Ethical Technology

The Copenhagen Letter

I believe that we all have responsibility for how we live our lives and the way we interact with the community and people around us: our family, our friends, our colleagues, our global and local community.

There are some of us in a privileged position of being able to work in technology: to be able to work in jobs that create products and services that entertain, save time, save money and sometimes save lives. And to do that you get to work with amazing people, solving complex problems by inventing new things, and on top of that you get well paid to do it and work in an environment that feels great.

However, as we have seen this year, it’s not too much of a leap for those same technologies to be used for purposes that feel fundamentally wrong.

That is why, as a leader of a growing technology company, earlier this year I signed the Copenhagen Letter.

It’s a list of five principles that cover democratic accountability, transparency and auditability, progress harnessed to public service, and an eye for the social dimension of technological decision-making.

If these are important to you, you should sign it too.

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