Instant Messaging and Privacy

1. Instant Messaging and Privacy Sameer Patil University of California, Irvine (& IBM T. J. Watson Research Center) Alfred Kobsa University of California, Irvine DIMACS Workshop, NJ

2. Motivation For effective and efficient collaboration and coordination across distance, individuals need as much information as possible about the activities of other team members. This need for awareness of other team members may, however, be in conflict with team members’ individual desires of privacy. PRIVACY AWARENESS DIMACS Workshop, NJ

3. Motivation Understanding current practices and expectations may help build more privacy-sensitive frameworks for capturing, maintaining, providing and seeking awareness information. Such systems will empower users to seamlessly (and continually) find the right balance between privacy and awareness using socio-technical means. DIMACS Workshop, NJ

4. Research Questions Balancing Awareness and Privacy • Is it a problem? • How is it handled today? • Can technology help? We have used Instant Messaging (IM) as a starting point for exploring these issues. DIMACS Workshop, NJ

5. Importance of IM Privacy • IM is being increasingly used in collaboration • But indications of privacy concerns in several studies • Grinter and Palen (2002) “Instant Messaging in Teen Life” • Begole et. al. (2002) “Work Rhythms: Analyzing Visualizations of Awareness Histories of Distributed Groups” • Different responses: • Organizational policies: still in the evolution stage • Privacy policies in IM systems: different in every system • Privacy settings in IM systems: different for every system • Personal strategies?? Unclear, vary widely? DIMACS Workshop, NJ

6. 7 Diverse Subjects Software Developer Graphic Designer Software Engineer Doctoral Student Technical Support Staff Engineer Undergraduate Student ~ 1 1/2 hour interviews Recorded and transcribed 5 Males, 2 Females Mid 20s – Early 30s Except undergraduate (20), and Engineer (> 55) 4 interviews conducted at location where IM is used the most No compensation Semi-structured Interviews DIMACS Workshop, NJ

7. Findings Three common concerns • Privacy from non-contacts desire for very high degree of privacy from people not on contact lists • Privacy regarding availability privacy from interruption or distraction from the current task • Privacy regarding content desire to prevent contents of IM communication from being available to unintended third parties DIMACS Workshop, NJ

8. Privacy from Non-contacts • Non-contacts: • Strangers with unknown intentions • Contacts: • Trusted Acquaintances • Lowered Privacy Barrier • No public profile (exception undergraduate) • Users are careful about who is added DIMACS Workshop, NJ

9. Privacy Regarding Availability • Privacy from interruption or distraction • Different expectations when working as opposed to not working • Plausible deniability [Nardi et. al. (2000)] • “Home” extends into “work” • but rarely vice versa! • Different levels of availability for different groups of people based on location and (work) context DIMACS Workshop, NJ

10. Privacy Regarding Content • Expectations similar to email • for monitoring, sniffing, saving or sharing • Informal policies for sharing • Unease at the possibility of the other party saving conversation • Switch in medium for sensitive conversations • phone or face-to-face • Concern for others watching screen contents • minimize windows • turn off monitor • physical rearrangement (if possible) DIMACS Workshop, NJ

11. Managing Impression • An important driving force behind people’s privacy in the context of IM seems to be the desire to control how they appear to others. • Available to different extent to different groups • Desire to control saving/sharing of conversations • Desired impression dependent on relationship • friend, family, peer, superior, stranger etc. • Practices influenced by: • defaults, personal preferences, prior knowledge & experiences, group norms, organizational policies, cultural expectations DIMACS Workshop, NJ

12. Managing Impression The desire to manage one’s impression is likely to strongly influence the point of balance between demands for privacy and the consent to disclose awareness information. Privacy-sensitive collaboration system should empower users to seamlessly manage their “impression” as seen by various parties involved. DIMACS Workshop, NJ

13. Implications for Design • Defaults Provide defaults that are widely applicable across persons and situations. These could include typical profiles (e.g., “manager”, “student”, “secretary”) with appropriate settings. • Modifiable policies Allow for user modifiability of default privacy policies, so that users can cater to the current context. • Visibility Give users the opportunity to inspect various pieces of information about themselves that can be viewed by others. • Interaction Design the interaction with users in such a way that specifying or modifying status, settings or policies requires little or no time and effort. DIMACS Workshop, NJ

14. Heather Pulliam Gloria Mark Bonnie Nardi Cleidson de Souza Becky Grinter Paul Dourish Max Teltzrow Keri Carpenter Acknowledgments DIMACS Workshop, NJ

15. Questions DIMACS Workshop, NJ