The Information Technology Association of America defines IT / Information Technology as “the study, design, development, implementation, support or management of computer-based information systems, particularly software applications and computer hardware.”  When discussing
IT / information technology in a social context, other than hastening to move the conversation on, the usual understanding is that it means computers and all their misdeeds.

It is also not clear that those who first started to describe the sector as “Information Technology” truly envisioned the current situation, where the end result is sharing, processing, manipulation and interpretation of information.  Indeed the majority of practitioners still concern themselves more with technology than information.

Much of the current thinking about IT / information technology was closely pre-figured in universities and research bodies, which is why university departments such as the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and academic journals such as Journal of Information Technology.

But information technology is now pervasive, and so subject to comment in the popular media such as the BBC, and government interest and monitoring such as the Information Commission.