Ethics and governance for internet-based conservation science research

Internet-based research is increasingly important for conservation science with wide-ranging applications and contexts, including culturomics, the illegal wildlife trade, and citizen science. However, online research methods pose a range of ethical and legal challenges. Online data may be protected by copyright, database rights, or contract law. Privacy rights may also restrict the use and access of data, as well as ethical requirements from institutions. Online data has real-world meaning, and the ethical treatment of individuals and communities must not be marginalized when conducting Internet-based research. As ethics frameworks originally developed for biomedical applications are inadequate for these methods, we propose that research activities involving the analysis of pre-existing online data is treated analogously to offline social science methods, in particular, non-deceptive covert observation. By treating Internet users and their data with respect and due consideration, conservationists can uphold the public trust needed to effectively address real-world issues.