Ethical isn't a silly concept; it sounds like an abstract term, a proposition, while it is actually more nuanced; it is a spectrum, not an absoluteness. And it goes beyond technology.

There's also social ethics which the company Fairphone tries to tackle with their products (Fairphone, Fairphone 2, and the upcoming successor). They're transparent about their ethics [1] which contains examples about sourcing ethical cobalt, the supply chain of the displays, and so on.

[1] https://www.fairphone.com/en/blog/