Ethics in Samsung Phone Production and the Need for Responsible

Sourcing
Samsung Electronics is one of the worlds biggest producers of mobile
phones, though little do people know about the dark secrets behind the
devices many consumers use every day. The production of Samsung phones
contains many ethical violations. This report will first cover Samsungs
missteps and intended improvements in unethically sourced materials, health
and safety violations in factories, and corruption. The report will then
elaborate on the unethicality of these actions along with possible solutions,
followed by a discussion of the roots of these problems.
Irresponsible Material Sourcing
Samsung has used materials in its Galaxy phones that were unethically
sourced. In 2012, the Guardian news agency in conjunction with the charity
Friends of the Earth (FoE) found evidence of dangerous working conditions
and use of child labour in illegal tin mines in Bangka Island in Indonesia, with
many workers being buried alive as a result of pit collapses. Tin mining also
affected the environment, clearing areas of forest and contaminating water
sources near the mines. Following pressure from a FoE campaign, Samsung
admitted to sourcing some of its tin used in solder for its mobile phones from
Bangka. Admittedly, this is not only a problem faced by Samsung, but also by
many others in the electronics industry (Hodal, 2013). However, the decision
to use tin from Bangka is obviously an unethical decision and is still partly
Samsungs responsibility as it creates a demand for such tin and hence
perpetuates the employment of children and workers in life-threatening
working conditions. Using Bangka tin also shows a disregard for the adverse
effects of unregulated tin sourcing on the environment, which in addition has
also resulted in a substantial dent in tourism, a source of income that the local
government had hoped would replace the dangerous mining in the future
(Hodal, 2012).
However, Samsung has also taken actions into improving the ethicality
of their supply chain. Following the public statement, Samsung began working
with the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC) and the Indonesian
government to find solutions for the problem. Furthermore, Samsung also
began investigations into all of their sources of tin (Samsung, n.d.). This is an
ethical decision as it tries to take into account the health and safety of those
extracting materials by identifying unethical mines, so that improvements can
be made to the working conditions of the mines. However, this requires
Samsung to take active steps to improve working conditions in the mines,
something that Samsung has currently shown little evidence of doing (Hodal,
2012). Unfortunately, this problem does not merely occur in material
extraction.
Toxic Conditions in Factories
Similarly, there are also health and safety issues regarding to the
factory production of phones that Samsung has failed to address. Since 2007,
it has been widely publicized that several workers at a Korean factory

producing semiconductors for Samsung phones died as a result of cancers

caused by chemicals used for cleaning at the factory, a link denied by
Samsung. Thus far, the company has refused to compensate families and
even challenged families who took the case to court (Simpson, 2014a).
Samsungs refusal to take responsibility shows a significant disregard for the
health and safety of its workers, effectively shortening the lives of workers and
is hence highly unethical.
In recent years, Samsung has started to make amends to health and
safety issues surrounding its factories. In 2014, Samsung publically
apologized to the families for failing to resolve this issue and promised
compensation. However, the company still denied the connection between the
cancer and chemicals used at the factory (Simpson, 2014a). This is ethical in
the sense that families have been promised compensation, presumably to pay
for the treatment of sick workers and hence the company is considering the
health of its workers. However, Samsungs denial of any connection between
the cancer and the chemicals used means that no further action has been
taken to protect the health of workers currently employed in the factories, a
highly unethical decision (Simpson, 2014b).
Corruption
It isnt merely health and safety issues that affect Samsung phone
production, Honesty and fair dealing is another area of ethics where Samsung
performs poorly. The company wields a substantial amount of influence over
the South Korean government such that when Samsungs chairman was
convicted for tax evasion in 2007, he had his sentence suspended and was
pardoned shortly after through the use of bribes (McNeill, 2013). Samsung is
unethical in this regard as this is a form of corruption, and gives an unfair
economic advantage to Samsung over other companies (Choe, 2008). This is
particularly true in regards to claims that Samsung has used this government
influence to fix prices, reducing the attractiveness of products made by
smaller companies to the consumer and hence unfairly reducing their
competitiveness in the domestic market (Harlan, 2012).
Possible Solutions
Overall, these aforementioned ethical violations require solutions, for
instance, the use of Bangka tin. The use of Bangka tin is a particular bad
violation as it shows irresponsibility in protecting the health and safety of
workers, one of the key principles of engineering ethics, and leads to the
deaths of workers. An obvious solution would be to source the tin from other
places. However, the growing demand for mobile devices is preventing this,
as companies including Samsung look for cheap resources to maximize
profits (Hodal, 2012). Hence, a possible solution is for Samsung to increase
public awareness of this issue in conjunction with sourcing tin from elsewhere.
Though this would lead to a higher cost of production, Samsungs public
image would be greatly improved compared to other companies, which could
increase demand such as to nullify the higher resource costs, in addition to
saving countless lives.

In addition to the workers in tin mines, another violation in similar need

of a solution is the safety of workers in factories. This violation is arguably
even worse than the previous one as Samsung directly employs these
workers and yet has refused to claim responsibility for the deaths, something
that clearly does not hold the safety of workers paramount (Simpson, 2014a).
To solve this, Samsung has to switch to alternative, non-toxic chemicals for
cleaning, which according to advocacy groups would only involve small
increases in resource cost (Cuthbertson, 2014). Failing to do so would cause
Samsung to incur continued media backlash and legal action from families as
more workers die, something that would dent consumer demand.
This media backlash could also be further exacerbated by Samsungs
use of corrupt practices to enable tax evasion, hence requiring a solution. Not
only are these corrupt actions illegal, it also puts smaller companies who are
less endowed with monetary resources at a significant disadvantage, putting
these companies out of business (Harlan, 2012). This shows a lack of honesty
and integrity, a key principle in ethical engineering. Unfortunately, this issue is
the most difficult to solve as Samsung accounts for a fifth of Koreas GDP and
has very good relations with the Korean government (Harlan, 2012). However,
continued corrupt practices could lead to increased public animosity, which
could lead to the election of a government that is less lenient when it comes to
bribery. Hence, it is in Samsungs best interests to stop corrupt practices.
Possible Causes
It is however, important to not only consider the possible solutions to
these problems but also the issues that caused these problems in the first
place. Firstly, Samsung assigned the responsibility of sourcing materials to its
suppliers such as the solder manufacturer Chernan (Hodal, 2012). A better
awareness of the supply chain and stricter policies for suppliers would prevent
irresponsible sourcing, which as mentioned before can improve Samsungs
public image. Pertaining to the factory worker deaths, the company took
economic considerations before safety considerations, preferring cheaper
chemicals that evaporated quickly for faster production (Cuthbertson, 2014).
The company also hid behind studies that claimed no correlation between
cancer and the chemicals used, leading to inaction (Simpson, 2014a). Facing
increased media scrutiny, Samsung must also consider the damaging effect
that this negligence has had on their public image, which could lead to
reduced profits and further worker deaths.
The production of Samsung phones that many carry in their pockets
every day is fraught with ethical problems. Samsung has taken some action
against unethical practices through public statements and investigations into
sourcing (Samsung, n.d.). However, these actions do little to solve the issues
of irresponsible material sourcing, factory safety and corruption. Hence, it is
recommended that Samsung uses new material sources while raising public
awareness on ethical supply chains, switch to non-toxic chemicals in factories
and stop tax evasion and other corrupt practices. In addition to improving
ethicality, these actions will help to boost public perception of the company,
reduce the amount of media backlash and hence help to increase demand for

Samsung phones. Only if bigger companies like Samsung set an example of

ethical production, will other companies follow suit, ensuring that these
problems dont continue to occur.

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