The Doctrine of Cyber Effect: An Ethics Framework for Defensive Cyber Deception

The lack of established rules and regulations in cyberspace is attributed to the absence of agreed-upon ethical principles, making it difficult to establish accountability, regulations, and laws. Addressing this challenge requires examining cyberspace from fundamental philosophical principles. This work focuses on the ethics of using defensive deception in cyberspace, proposing a doctrine of cyber effect that incorporates five ethical principles: goodwill, deontology, no-harm, transparency, and fairness. To guide the design of defensive cyber deception, we develop a reasoning framework, the game of ethical duplicity, which is consistent with the doctrine. While originally intended for cyber deception, this doctrine has broader applicability, including for ethical issues such as AI accountability and controversies related to YouTube recommendations. By establishing ethical principles, we can promote greater accountability, regulation, and protection in the digital realm.