Week 9: Misuse of Social Technology

As technology develops day by day, it has taken a huge part in our lives. Even though there are many advantages of technology, there are same amount of disadvantages out there. Technology helps us to keep in touch with people and it helps to develop business. Also, using technology can leads us to change our views, feeling and behaviours.  

Overview of the Organisation

Samsung is a multinational conglomerate company and headquarters in Samsung Town, Seoul, South Korea. Lee Byung-chul found the Samsung in 1938 as a trading company. In three decades time, they expanded the group into areas such as, textiles, insurance, securities, food processing and retail. After Lee’s death in 1987, Samsung divided into four different business groups include Samsung Group, Shinsegae Group, CJ Group and Hansl Group.  

Misuse of Social Technology

            Samsung has hired bloggers and students to write negative online blogs and to comment about one of the competitors mobile brand of Samsung which is HTC. The reviewers did not reveal their real information due to the fact that they could get caught easily. They thought community will think that the information the reviewers provided were real. They were fined $340,000 by a regulator in Taiwan for paying people to write intentional negative comments. This left a huge black mark towards their brand name; they must have lost some of their customers due to this incident. Furthermore, Korean Smartphone maker fined $10,000 by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) for advertising some errors of camera features of the Galaxy Duos handset.

How could the organisation avoid such a "misuse" in the future? 

            This led them to lose their everyday customers since it’s an illegal, unethical and somewhat ruined the reputation of the business. There are many ways to avoid these types of misuse in the future such as, Samsung can make sure that this kind of unethical activities are no longer exist in their business, as a result they can build up a good customer relationship and better profit margin. 

 I have selected 3 Ethical Principles for Business Executives to back up my opinions.  (Josephaon, 2013)

    1. Honesty

Trust worthiness and honesty is the most important factors that a company needs to catch the customer’s attention. Samsung has led to the place where they are losing their customers because they could not manage to keep the trust between the consumers and the brand.     

    2. Respect for others

Respecting other competitors in the business world will not harm the company or the products that they are producing. Keeping up the respect for other competitors will help the company to be more successful in the business world. Since Samsung did not respect the other competitors, that left a black mark on their name.

   3. Fairness

Each company has its own rules, regulations and laws relating to their business activities. It is against the law to be unethical as they did to the HTC Company and this is why Taiwan Regulator ordered them to pay $340,000.      

References

Bates, D. (2013). Samsung ordered to pay $340,000 after it paid people to write negative online reviews about HTC phones. Retrieved from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2476630/Samsung-ordered-pay-340-000-paid-people-write-negative-online-reviews-HTC-phones.html

Harbison, C. (2013). Samsung fined $340,000 for fake HTC reviews: paid comments slamming competitors revealed by FTC. Retrieved from http://www.idigitaltimes.com/samsung-fined-340000-fake-htc-reviews-paid-comments-slamming-competitors-revealed-ftc-video-334235

Josephson, M. (2010). 12 ethical principles for business executives by Michael Josephson. Retrieved from http://josephsoninstitute.org/business/blog/2010/12/12-ethical-principles-for-business-executives/

Wikipedia. (2014). Samsung. Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsung