Ethical and Unethical Marketing Practices in the Digital Age

Document Type

Book Chapter

Publication Title

The Impact of Marketing Strategies on Society

Abstract

The rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) poses new ethical challenges to the marketing discipline and practice, arguably the most paradoxical field in business regarding ethical implications. Ethical marketing concerns are increasing with the rapid developments in AI technologies. This chapter provides a comprehensive overview of unethical marketing practices in the context of AI. It highlights that the prominent AI-related ethical issues are data privacy violations associated with data collection, usage, and storage, and manipulative marketing due to synthetic media, deepfakes, and manipulative algorithms. Despite those ethical challenges, AI can enhance community well-being and societal welfare through AI for social good, which can be implemented as better and efficient public administration, government-business-consumer collaborations, and impactful social marketing campaigns. By focusing on AI-enabled ethical marketing practices and adopting an ethical culture around AI, society can mitigate the negative consequences of AI for the common good.

Research Highlights

  • The Problem: The marketing discipline faces increasing ethical challenges and paradoxes regarding business practice due to the rapid development of artificial intelligence technologies.

  • The Method: The chapter provides a comprehensive overview of unethical marketing practices to analyze the impact of AI on the field.

  • Qualitative Finding: Prominent ethical issues include data privacy violations regarding collection and storage; manipulative tactics employ synthetic media, deepfakes, and algorithms; AI simultaneously offers potential for social good through efficient public administration and government-business-consumer collaborations.

DOI

10.1007/978-3-032-08423-1_16

Publication Date

1-2026

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