Responding to COVID-19: Privacy Implications of the Rapid Adoption of ICTs

ABSTRACT

COVID-19 increased reliance on information communication technologies (ICTs) as public and private organizations altered standard business operations to adhere to public health guidance. Across most sectors, technology deployment was swift, which left organizations with little opportunity to assess corresponding impacts. This chapter highlights various technologies implemented during the pandemic within four key sectors, government, education, healthcare, and employment, and the purpose these technologies serve. Social implications of the widespread use of these technologies are discussed, emphasizing privacy, trust, ethics, and potential effects on socially vulnerable populations. Through the Company Information Privacy Orientation (CIPO) privacy framework, this chapter also presents factors that public and private organizations should consider in emergency technology deployment. The chapter closes with research considerations to further understand the role of ethics, privacy, and trust in using ICTs, to facilitate core functions of life, which will continue after the pandemic ebbs away. © 2023, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.