Privacy Management and the Social Web

Privacy Management and the Social Web

Dr. Jan Schmidt

Senior Researcher for Digital Interactive Media and Political Communication

GOR 2008, Hamburg, 13.02.2008

Dr. Jan Schmidt Page 2 of 17

The Social Web: Key Functions

Social Web facilitates practices of…

www.flickr.com/photos/44029537@N00/12760664/

– Identity management (Expressing individual interests, experiences, opinions, skills, etc.)

http://flickr.com/photos/mylesdgrant/495698908/

– Relationship management (articulating and maintaining existing relationships, finding and contacting new people)

http://www.flickr.com/photos/axels_bilder/1267008046/

– Information management (finding, selecting and sharing information and content)


e.g. blogging


e.g. Social Network Sites (1)


e.g. Social Network Sites (2)


Social Web and Privacy

Online-based identity- and relationship management assist

1. Formation and maintenance of social networks which provide social capital (useful for exchange of information; socio-emotional support; stabilizing group identites; etc.)


Visualizing social networks


Social Web und Privacy



2. Formation of public spheres on different topics and with different reach / audience sizes; especially important: „personal publics“ dealing with topics of personal relevance and aiming at rather small audiences


Personal publics in Facebook


Social Web and Privacy



2. Formation of public spheres on different topics and with different reach / audience sizes; especially important: „personal publics“ dealing with topics of personal relevance and aiming at rather small audiences

Users of the social web provide personal information within social networks and (personal) publics, thus shifting boundaries between private and public spheres

– Characteristics of online-based publics (cf. boyd 2007)– Persistence– Searchibility– Replicability– Invisible Audiences

These characteristics of online-based publics call for practices of „privacy management“: ways of regulating access to personal information


Individual and situated use of social web applications is framed by three structural dimension which get (re)produced through social action (cf. Schmidt 2007 for general analytical model)

– Rules: Shared expectations and routines how to adequately use a given application for identity- and relationship management in a given situation; e.g. what personal information to share on a business network or in a private blog

– Relations: hypertextual and social networks which are articulated through social web applications; subcultural-, age- or gender-specific networks will [presumably] share different rules on how to engage in identity- and relationship management, which in turn will lead to more open or more closed networks

– Code: Software of social web applications provides specific options and restrictions for identity- and relationship management (e.g. allowing to restrict access to personal information to confirmed contacts only); „application programming interfaces“ (API) provide means for sharing data between different applications (e.g. Google‘s „open social“ inititative)

Privacy management practices: Analytical framework

Situated use-Identity management

-Relationship management-Information management

Code

Relations Rules


Rules: Different routines for identity- and relationship management


Rules: Different routines for identity- and relationship management


Code assisting privacy management


Code assisting formation of personal publics


Summary and outlook

1. Social Web provides various tools and means to articulate, maintain and expand social relations

2. Mediated identity- and relationship management leads to formation of personal publics3. Personal publics shift boundaries between private and public spheres, calling for new

practices of privacy management4. Privacy management happens in respect to certain social networks (= audiences) and

includes both socially shared routines and expectations as well as options and restrictions layed out in software code

5. Routines, expectations and instances of software code should be topic of social discourse on questions like:– Do I have full control over my personal information? How and when can I allow or prevent anyone

else (A friend of mine? The company providing an application? An unkown person data-mining my profile?) access to my information?

- Who owns relational data, e.g. the information that me and person x are friends since we‘ve met at the Tokio Hotel concert two years ago?

- Should there be an „expiry date“ for personal data?- How far can privacy be regulated through code? Who is shaping and regulating the code itself?


Thank You!

Dr. Jan Schmidt

Hans-Bredow-Institut

Warburgstr. 8-10, 20354 Hamburg

[email protected]

www.hans-bredow-institut.de

www.schmidtmitdete.de


Facets of digital identity

http://www.flickr.com/photos/fredcavazza/278973402/


Further Reading

– Bendrath, Ralf (2007): Der „gläserne Bürger“ und der vorsorgliche Staat. Zum Verhältnis von Überwachung und Sicherheit in der Informationsgesellschaft. In: kommunikation@gesellschaft, Jg. 8, Beitrag 7, 2007. Online: http://www.soz.unifrankfurt.de/K.G/B7_2007_Bendrath.pdf

– Boyd, Danah (2007): Incantations for Muggles: The role of ubiquitious Web 2.0 technologies in everyday life. Vortrag bei der O‘Reilly Emerging Technology Conference, San Diego, 28.3.2007. Online: http://www.danah.org/papers/Etech2007.html

– Hogben, Giles (2007) Security Issues and Recommendations for Online Social Networks. ENISA Position Paper Nr. 1. Online: http://www.enisa.europa.eu/doc/pdf/deliverables/enisa_pp_social_networks.pdf

– Renz, Florian (2007): Praktiken des Social Networking. Eine kommunikationssoziologische Studie zum online-basierten Netzwerken am Beispiel von openBC (XING). Boizenburg: Verlag Werner Hülsbusch

– Schmidt, Jan (2007): Social Software: Facilitating information-, identity- and relationship managament. In: Burg, Thomas N. / Jan Schmidt (Eds.): BlogTalks Reloaded. Social Software - Research and Cases. Vienna/Norderstedt: Books on Demand. 2007. 31-49. Online: http://www.bamberg-gewinnt.de/wordpress/wp-content/pdf/blogtalksreloaded_3_schmidt.pdf .