Social Glue

Data Security and Privacy, MSc in Software and Systems Security. Department of Computer Science, University of Oxford.

(Talk) at the 2020 USENIX Conference on Privacy Engineering Practice and Respect (PEPR 20). Virtual event. There’s a gap between the personal focus of data protection legislation and practices, and the communal implications of internet-connected technology. Through our research, we’ve started to explore how existing design tools and methods can help understand and address communal implications. […]

(Workshop Paper) accepted to Privacy and Power, the Networked Privacy Workshop at CHI 2020 in Hawaii, USA. Taking care of technology for a dependent can be a daunting task. Often poorly resourced and lacking the formal training and codes of practise available to professionals, those giving informal digital care need to be understood and empowered by the […]

Empowering households to tend their digital devices (Article) in Linacre News (college magazine) Voice assistants, household helpers, toys and smart building technology, powered by electricity and data, all are making their way into ever more households. New things brought to our homes for the purpose of ‘making life simpler’ inevitably challenge the way we do things.  […]

(Paper, 2nd author) accepted to CHI 2020 in Hawaii, USA. Connected devices in the home represent a potentially grave new privacy threat due to their unfettered access to the most personal spaces in people’s lives. Prior work has shown that despite concerns about such devices, people often lack sufficient awareness, understanding, or means of taking effective action. […]

(Extended Abstract) accepted to CHI 2020 in Hawaii, USA. Device use in smart homes is becoming increasingly communal, requiring cohabitants to navigate a complex social and technological context. In this paper, we report findings from an exploratory survey grounded in our prior work on communal technology use in the home [4]. The findings highlight the importance of […]

Conference paper (peer-reviewed) accepted to Halfway to the Future Symposium in Nottingham, UK Vacuum cleaners, dish washers, and computers have had a lasting impact on ordinary life, and the last wave of ubiquitous technology, smart home technology, once again alters social order and practices in the home. Increasingly pervasive and internet-connected, domestic technology has become a […]

William Seymour and Martin Kraemer discuss their new project ‘Informing the Future of Data Protection in Smart Homes’ Published in the 2019 Yearbook, Centre for Doctoral Training in Cyber Security. University of Oxford. The rollout of the European General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has had a big impact in the cyber security world, with many […]

(Report) published in Privacy Laws & Business, UK. Issue 105. September 2019. Martin Kraemer and William Seymour at the University of Oxford report on an ICO-funded research project investigating how ‘smart’ doesn’t have to mean invasive.

Workshop paper accepted to CHI 19 Workshop on New Directions for the IoT: Automate, Share, Build, and Care in Glasgow, UK Recent changes to data protection regulation, particularly in Europe, are changing the design landscape for smart devices, requiring new design techniques to ensure that devices are able to adequately protect users’ data. A particularly interesting […]