Principles Most of my PhD supervision activity is related to the Information Socity Doctoral Programme (ISDP). The principle of the ISDP is that students develop their own research projects. However, experience shows that there are many applicants who are interested in doing a PhD in the area of social and ethical aspects of technology but who would appreciate guidance on suitable topics. For these individuals I have started this list of possible topics. They should be understood as inspirations that will need to be developed in more depth by the potential student. Networks of technology ethics Ethics is often described as a way to see and problematise issues in technology. It is the basis of policy and regulation and an inspiration for personal and professional behaviour. This proposal would take a different and descriptive view of technology ethics. It would explore how the meaning of ethics is negotiated between the different stakeholder groups and what the mechanisms, translations and enrolments are that have taken place to lead to the current position. The project could take an Actor-Network Theory view of ethics and explore, for example, the development of technology ethics in the European Union. Security discourses The media are full of high profile news regarding cyber security threats. Enormous damages are assumed and the threats seem to extend to all citizens of modern societies. This project would undertake a critical discourse analysis of the current cybersecurity discourses. It would investigate how these publications come into being, which evidence is used, how they are financed and how they relate to each other. Ethics of emerging technologies The ETICA project has identified a number of emerging technologies that are likely to be socially relevant in the next 10 to 15 years. These technologies are likely to raise ethical issues that are currently developing. For more detail see the project website. From this research a number of possible PhD projects can arise. Most of the individual technologies are in need of further investigation. A different approach could be a comparative analysis. One suitable way of addressing these issues would be that of disclosive ethics. Religion and approaches to technology Research on information technology and information systems is based on a number of ontological, epistemological and methodological views. The literature tends to say that researchers need to select the approach most suitable for their specific research question. It  is not obvious, however, whether resesarchers are in a position and willing to explore possible alternatives. One reason is that individual researchers have a particular worldview which may imply some views and rule out others. An important part of such a worldview is constituted by religious beliefs. This project could explore to what degree the views of researchers are linked to or even determined by their religious convictions. Current ethical approaches and their application to technology Much work on computer and information ethics concentrates on a relatively limited number of ethical theories (i.e. utilitarianism, (Kantian) deontology and virtue ethics). While there are numerous scholars in the area who employ other ethical approaches or develop specific new ones (e.g. information ethics, disclosive ethics), there is scope for a further broadening of the field. Possible PhD projects in this area would look at neighbouring fields, such as medical ethics, bioethics or business ethics and explore to which extent they could inform debate in computer and information ethics. Technology ethics as management / policy fashion There has been much research on management fashions in the area of business studies. Such fashions follow typical patterns in terms of attention paid to the object of fashion over time. Public attention to ethics rises and falls. The project would apply the ideas of management fasion and explore to what degree ethics in general and technology ethics in particular can be interpreted as a fashion. Social network analysis of technology ethics While there has been much research on technology and ethics, it is not always clear whether this research has an impact on technology research and development or whether it is an example of a closed circle of initiated individuals talking to each other. One way of coming to a better understanding of this would be to undertake a social network analysis of individuals in the area of technology (or maybe only ICT) and ethics. This could be done by exploring memberships of projects, authorships, editorships, websites etc. Such an analysis would provide a deeper understanding of the social structures behind technology ethics.