Glass Onion:�A Knives Out Mystery

Kristen Thebeau, Reid Dugas, Cheuk Ngai Alden Lo, Yuankai Shen

CS 3043 Social Implications of Information Processing

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Movie Summary

• Benoit Blanc (Detective) mysteriously invited to island retreat of tech billionaire Miles Bron.
• Other guests include old friends of Miles, can attribute their success to him.
• Blanc sees guests each have personal and professional reasons to want to kill Miles.
• A real murder suddenly occurs – an investigation for Blanc.
• Blanc discovers and reveals motives, tensions, lies, and betrayals, revealing the truth.

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Computing Technologies

• Cell Phones – music recognition & Google alerts
• Laptop
• Fax Machine
• Television
• Bio-rhythm monitor (haptics)
• Fire Detection / Prevention technology
• Luggage Robot
• What’s on the Napkin?
• Development of Klear

[7]

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1. Financial Capital allows businesses to take control of intellectual property, shunning the original creators.

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• Everyone experiences invasions of their privacy, despite efforts to mitigate them.

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• There is a growing distrust of electronic security, but people still must rely on it.

Conclusions

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Financial Capital allows businesses to take control of intellectual property, shunning the original creators.

Financial capital – not intellectual labor – dictates ownership and control.

Miles Bron:  

Unethical Entrepreneur

Complicit Beneficiaries

Dangerous Innovation

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Miles Bron: Unethical Entrepreneur

• IP issue: Capital above creator

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•  financial capital—not intellectual labor—dictates ownership and control. Mirroring real-world dynamics, where developers are marginalized while investors gain both credit and profit

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• Miles Bron, epitomizes the modern investor class that leverages wealth and power to usurp ideas from actual creators. Miles’ empire is built on Alpha, a company established by his former partner

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Miles Bron: Unethical Entrepreneur

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Complicit Beneficiaries

• IP Issue: Systemic enabling of IP theft.

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• These characters profit from Miles’s success, representing investors, board members, or employees who ignore unethical practices for personal gain. Their complacency reflects corporate cultures that prioritize profit over ethics

Complicit Beneficiaries

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Dangerous Innovation

• IP Issue: Ethical negligence in patent-driven innovation.

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• The consequences ripple beyond individual injustice; when profit-driven investors prioritize hype over substance (as with Klear’s dangerously flawed design), society bears the risks of half-baked innovations

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• Klear’s instability critiques how IP systems incentivize rushed, unsafe products (e.g., pharmaceutical patent monopolies). Miles’s dismissal of risks mirrors corporate disregard for public safety.

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Dangerous Innovation

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Everyone experiences invasions of their privacy, despite efforts to mitigate them.

Guests are famous, experience scrutiny into their personal lives and a lack of privacy.

(More characters and examples on website)

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Miles Uses Privacy to Commit Crimes Secretly

• Changes information about events and people to make him look better
• Controlled narrative of Andi’s severance with their company – made it look like he was the founder
• He kept actual company history private and manipulated/stole Andi’s intellectual property.
• Textbook section 5.2.2 states giving privacy can sometimes allow people to “carry out immoral or illegal activities” in secrecy. [1] Miles used the privacy to commit crimes and steal Andi’s IP.

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[7]

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Claire Faces Public Scrutiny of Personal Life

• Is a politician running for senate – currently governor
• Film is set during COVID-19 Pandemic, she doesn’t want public to find out about not following safety measures on island trip
• This is a case where lack of privacy because of high publicity doesn’t allow them to be themselves.
• Section 5.2.2 in the book states that privacy can be beneficial by allowing people to be themselves instead of having to maintain their public persona all the time. [1]
• Even though COVID measures can be taken, Claire would still likely face scrutiny for deciding to go.

[7]

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Whiskey Shares Controversial Opinions

• Is in public relationship with controversial YouTube streamer
• Says anti-feminist statements on his streams for publicity
• According to textbook 5.4.4, opinion mining is when sentiment is analyzed from social media posts and used to appeal to specific audiences based on the opinion. [1]
• Whiskey wants to be a politician later in life
• Her opinions shared could be used in opinion mining to bring her content to the wrong audiences.
• Her statements will be under high levels of scrutiny when working towards government position.

[7]

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There is a growing distrust of electronic security...

• Miles Bron

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• Over 60% of Americans today use voice assistants [2]
• Always passively listening
• Collect personal data for personalization

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• Fax machines are more secure than email [3]

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• Cyberattacks
• Spyware
• Evil Twin Attack
• Trojan Horses

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..but people still must rely on it.

Still, the reliability of computing devices is inevitable, especially with the younger generation

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Robotic Dog

• Whole island required 50 staff members to operate, however no staff was required over the weekend
• The "boring" operations like taking luggage to designated rooms are done by the robot dog
• Robot Dog is reliable and characters rely on the robot dog
• Can assume no malfunction or losing luggage, Robot Dog delivered the luggage to each guest's room, each guest had their luggage
• Parallel to how we rely on robots nowadays for day-to-day tasks: self-cleaning robots
• "2.1 Million Domestic Floor Cleaning Robots Sold in 2023"[4]

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Robotic Dog

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Bio-Rhythm Monitor

• Multiple functions built into a wristband: Door key, haptics, unique to each guest via their relationship with Miles
• Straps onto hand, thus impossible to lose, get stolen, drop, no matter the action that happened in the movie
• Information and data of room key stored in biorhythm monitor
• Replaces traditional keys and card keys
• Guests rely on biorhythm monitor to navigate the island

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Bio-Rhythm Monitor

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Parcel Sent by Miles

• Younger generation has a heavy reliance on computing devices and technologies when solving anything
• Parcel sent by Miles contains multiple basic puzzles, and the "Disruptors" could not solve a majority of the puzzles
• Duke's mum easily solved a few of the puzzles without looking much at the puzzles
• Signifies the difference of generations, learning with/without mobile phone
• The newer generation relies on mobile phone when it comes to solving problems
• Birdie has to "Shazam"[5] a song
• Lionel, the lead scientist has to double check with the search result on Duke's phone for the atomic number of silver

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Parcels Sent by Miles

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Real Life Parallel

• A study done by Clarissa Theodora Tanil and Min Hoo Yong[6]
• On "the effect of a smartphone's presence on learning and memory among undergraduates"[6]
• Phone conscious thought, FOMO[6]
• Ultimately, smartphones increase "cognitive load 'bandwidth effect' interrupting participants' memory processes."[6]

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References

[1] Title: Ethics for the Information Age / Michael J. Quinn, Seattle University. 

Description: Ninth edition. | Hoboken, NJ : Pearson, [2025] | Includes bibliographical references and index. 

Identifiers: LCCN 2023057085 | ISBN 9780138238537 (hardcover)

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[2] Oliver Buxton, "Is my phone listening to me? Yes, here's why and how to stop it" (Norton, 09/09/2024), https://us.norton.com/blog/how-to/is-my-phone-listening-to-me (04/28/2025)

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[3] GFI Software, "Are faxes more secure than email?" (GFI Software, 08/31/2021), https://gfi.ai/company/blog/2021/are-faxes-more-secure-than-email, (04/24/2025)

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[4] IFR International Federation of Robotics. “2,1 Million Domestic Floor Cleaning Robots Sold in 2023.” IFR International Federation of Robotics, 2023, ifr.org/post/21-million-domestic-floor-cleaning-robots-sold-in-2023. (Accessed on 04 May 2025)

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[5] “Shazam.” Shazam, 2019, www.shazam.com/company. (Accessed on 04, May, 2025)

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[6] Tanil, Clarissa Theodora, and Min Hooi Yong. “Mobile phones: The effect of its presence on learning and memory.” PloS one vol. 15,8 e0219233. 13 Aug. 2020, doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0219233 (Accessed on 06 May 2025)

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[7] Johnson, Rian, et al. “Glass Onion: A Knives out Mystery.” IMDb, 23 Dec. 2022,

 www.imdb.com/title/tt11564570/.

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