Privacy-Preserving Interconnected Interactions for Ubiquitous Devices

Smart technology allows hundreds of interconnected actions daily. For example, when users stream music with their smartphones and music streaming apps on smart speakers or broadcast videos from platforms with laptops to smart TVs. All these interactions require and involve different devices, software, and manufacturers. Albeit the comfort these interconnected interactions provide, several privacy-related questions arise as all these interactions generate and process potentially privacy-sensitive data. These questions range from who stores what kinds of data at which point of the interaction to who is in charge of protecting the users' data. Is it the device that started the interaction? Or does it switch, depending on the software or device in the foreground? With this project, we first want to understand users' mental models about these processes to foster privacy awareness effectively when needed. Based on these insights, we then want to establish concrete solutions to ensure a future of privacy-preserving interconnected interactions with ubiquitous devices.

You will:

• Perform a literature review
• Create concrete interconnected interaction scenarios for use in online survey
• Conduct a large-scale online survey
• Subsequent data analysis of survey results
• Summarize your findings in a thesis and present them to an audience
• (Optional) co-writing a research paper

You need:

• Strong communication skills in english and german
• Good knowledge of quantitative and qualitative studies
• Data analysis skills using Jupyter Notebooks and Python (for quantitative data)
• (Optional) knowledge of thematic analysis (for qualitative data)