Designing for Privacy - April 2021

PI(s), Co-PI(s), Researchers:

• Serge Egelman (ICSI)
• Alisa Frik (ICSI)
• Julia Bernd (ICSI)
  

HARD PROBLEM(S) ADDRESSED
Human Behavior and Policy-Governed Secure Collaboration

PUBLICATIONS

• Nothing to report this quarter.
  

KEY HIGHLIGHTS

• With students at UC Berkeley, we evaluated the familiarity of smartphone users with privacy and security settings, their expectations about their ability to configure those settings, their understanding of the privacy and security threats against which the settings are supposed to protect them, and their expectations about the effectiveness of the settings. We compared the findings across various socio-economic groups of participants to draw conclusions about what groups are especially vulnerable to the identified issues.
  
  In an online survey with 178 users with diverse backgrounds and demographics, we found that many people were not aware of smartphone privacy/security settings and their defaults, and had not configured them in the past, though they expressed willingness to do it in the future. Some participants perceived low self-efficacy and expected difficulties and usability issues with configuring those settings. We found that, compared to so-called "average users", certain user groups, such as older adults, racial/ethnic minorities, and females, were less concerned about online privacy and security, engaged less in configuring smartphone privacy and security settings, and expected more difficulties with configuring them and more negative impacts on user experience. But even the "average users" in that survey expressed low levels of awareness and engagement, and some concerns about their expected difficulties with configuring smartphone privacy/security settings.
  
  A paper on this work has been submitted and is under review for (Proceedings on) Privacy Enhancing Technologies (PoPETS).

• We are continuing to analyze and thematically code the interviews described in our January report with nannies and au pairs about their experiences with and views of working in homes with cameras and smart home devices. Our analysis particularly focuses on identifying the most feasible points of intervention for improving domestic employees' control over the privacy effects of such devices, whether technical controls or in terms of negotiations between nannies and employers, such as guidelines and education (see Community Engagements).

• We are revising our narrative literature review and model of factors that affect product designers' and developers' decision-making about privacy and security (described in our January report) for submission to a journal.

COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENTS

• We are working with colleagues at the University of Oxford who are organizing events for domestic workers about their privacy rights and options, to help them develop workshop content incorporating insights from the studies with nannies mentioned above.

EDUCATIONAL ADVANCES:

• The study on smartphone settings was conducted in collaboration with several student researchers at UC Berkeley (masters student and undergrads), providing research experiences and contributing to a publication track record early in their academic careers.