Investigating how Users Imagine their Personal Privacy Assistant
Authors: Alina Stöver (TU Darmstadt), Sara Hahn (TU Darmstadt), Felix Kretschmer (TU Darmstadt), Nina Gerber (TU Darmstadt)
Volume: 2023
Issue: 2
Pages: 384–402
DOI: https://doi.org/10.56553/popets-2023-0059
Abstract: Personal Privacy Assistants (PPAs) can support users in managing their privacy. Conducting a user study, we provide qualitative and quantitative insights into how users imagine their PPA and how PPAs designs can appear for different user groups. We highlight five aspects derived from the literature that are essential when designing a PPA: What features should the PPA have? How should the PPA learn the users’ preferences? What level of user involvement in its decisions should the PPAs have? Which vendor should offer the PPA? What data are users willing to disclose to their PPA? Our results provide a holistic view of user perceptions of PPAs. We identify two user groups that differ in their characteristics, such as technology affinity and privacy concerns, and have different ideas of a PPA in terms of automation level and provider, for example. We discuss our results in relation to the literature and derive recommendations for designing PPAs to fulfill user needs.
Keywords: Personal Privacy Assistant, User Study, Interview, Privacy by Design, User Perception
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