Ethics in Statistics and Data Science: "With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility"

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The ever-growing abundance and accessibility of data continue to create opportunities for better understanding and decision-making. These opportunities exist across the entire value chain, from those who collect and analyze data to the consumers and citizens who benefit from improved knowledge, products, and services. As key participants of this value chain, practitioners of statistics and data science have important ethical responsibilities. However, numerous ethical considerations often go unnoticed, simply because they are not recognized as such. They often involve risks and cause meaningful harm in ways that we may not be aware of. While negative consequences are rarely intentional, we have the responsibility as professionals and citizens to anticipate and mitigate adverse impacts. We aim to raise awareness about the ethical role we play as responsible stewards throughout the data value chain. We explore applicable ethical principles, the challenges we face, and propose thought frameworks to help us integrate ethics into our daily work.