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Research Ethics and Intellectual Property Rights

Topic 5.1 of Research Ethics and Intellectual Property Rights

Foundations: The Belmont Principles

Why research ethics rules exist, the Tuskegee study that made them necessary, the three Belmont principles — Respect for Persons, Beneficence, and Justice — and how each translates into a security or machine learning research context.

~20 min total·4 quadrants of structured content

By the end of this topic, you will

State why the Belmont Report was written and the specific harm it was responding to
Explain the three Belmont principles and what obligation each one creates for a researcher
Apply the principles to a security/ML scenario using the table that maps each principle to the questions it raises in technical research
Distinguish between a human-subjects study and a data-subjects study and explain why the principles apply to both

Quadrant 1 · e-Tutorial

Video lectures and walkthroughs

Video content coming soon.

Quadrant 2 · e-Content

Articles and case studies

research-methodology

Foundations: The Belmont Principles

Research ethics rules did not appear because philosophers thought it would be tidy. They appeared because a federally funded study ran for forty years without telling participants their diagnosis, and without offering a treatment that became available partway through. Understanding where the rules come from is what makes them useful rather than merely bureaucratic.

8 min read

Quadrant 3 · Web Resources

Downloadable material and curated external links

Web resources coming soon.

Quadrant 4 · Self-Assessment

Test your knowledge — earn a certificate on first pass

Assessment coming soon.