Encouraging patron adoption of privacy-protection technologies:

Maceli, Monica

doi:10.1177/0340035218773786

Cited by 11 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 23 publications

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“…An important aspect of our study design was our selection of tools and assessment scenarios. We selected four privacy-centric browsing tools that have been discussed in the literature [41,54,77,100] and which offer a diverse set of protections: private browsing, VPNs, Tor Browser, and ad blockers. 1 These tools all broadly help people protect their privacy while browsing, but with varying effectiveness depending on the use case.…”

Section: Tools and Assessment Scenariosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Awareness, Adoption, and Misconceptions of Web Privacy Tools

Story¹,

Smullen²,

Yao

et al. 2021

Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies

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Privacy and security tools can help users protect themselves online. Unfortunately, people are often unaware of such tools, and have potentially harmful misconceptions about the protections provided by the tools they know about. Effectively encouraging the adoption of privacy tools requires insights into people’s tool awareness and understanding. Towards that end, we conducted a demographically-stratified survey of 500 US participants to measure their use of and perceptions about five web browsing-related tools: private browsing, VPNs, Tor Browser, ad blockers, and antivirus software. We asked about participants’ perceptions of the protections provided by these tools across twelve realistic scenarios. Our thematic analysis of participants’ responses revealed diverse forms of misconceptions. Some types of misconceptions were common across tools and scenarios, while others were associated with particular combinations of tools and scenarios. For example, some participants suggested that the privacy protections offered by private browsing, VPNs, and Tor Browser would also protect them from security threats – a misconception that might expose them to preventable risks. We anticipate that our findings will help researchers, tool designers, and privacy advocates educate the public about privacy- and security-enhancing technologies.

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Section: Tools and Assessment Scenariosmentioning

confidence: 99%

Awareness, Adoption, and Misconceptions of Web Privacy Tools

Story¹,

Smullen²,

Yao

et al. 2021

Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies

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“…Using VPNs serves as one of the means through which people can safeguard their privacy [15,16]. However, people can mistakenly perceive VPNs to completely protect their online privacy [17].…”

Section: Vpns As Petsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Emotional and Practical Considerations Towards the Adoption and Abandonment of VPNs as a Privacy-Enhancing Technology

Namara

Wilkinson

Caine

et al. 2020

Proceedings on Privacy Enhancing Technologies

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Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) can help people protect their privacy. Despite this, VPNs are not widely used among the public. In this survey study about the adoption and usage of VPNs, we investigate people’s motivation to use VPNs and the barriers they encounter in adopting them. Using data from 90 technologically savvy participants, we find that while nearly all (98%; 88) of the participants have knowledge about what VPNs are, less than half (42%; 37) have ever used VPNs primarily as a privacy-enhancing technology. Of these, 18% (7) abandoned using VPNs while 81% (30) continue to use them to protect their privacy online. In a qualitative analysis of survey responses, we find that people who adopt and continue to use VPNs for privacy purposes are primarily motivated by emotional considerations, including the strong desire to protect their privacy online, wide fear of surveillance and data tracking not only from Internet service providers (ISPs) but also governments and Internet corporations such as Facebook and Google. In contrast, people who are mainly motivated by practical considerations are more likely to abandon VPNs, especially once their practical need no longer exists. These people cite their access to alternative technologies and the effort required to use a VPN as reasons for abandonment. We discuss implications of these findings and provide suggestions on how to maximize adoption of privacy-enhancing technologies such as VPNs, focusing on how to align them with people’s interests and privacy risk evaluation.

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“…However, it seems that librarians are more comfortable with outreach that pertains to library-specific policies and actions, as opposed to the admittedly daunting task of PL and all that it entails. Furthermore, and of particular interest to the authors, many of these pieces are specific to public libraries (Maceli, 2018;Rundle, 2014) and K-12 institutions (Cirella, 2012;Maycock, 2010), rather than within higher education. In fact, several training and educational programs are available through public libraries (NYC Digital Safety, n.d.; San Jose Public Library, n.d.), and are documented in case studies within the K-12 context (Ballard, 2017;Seroff, 2017;Stephens, 2017).…”

Section: Privacy In the Lis Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Privacy literacy instruction practices in academic libraries: Past, present, and possibilities

Hartman‐Caverly

Chisholm

2020

IFLA Journal

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This article explores the past, present, and possibilities of privacy and privacy literacy (PL) instruction in academic libraries. It surveys the scholarship on privacy and privacy literacy from the domains of philosophy, anthropology, history, law, education, and LIS. A privacy conceptual model is proposed demonstrating the zones of informational agency that privacy preserves, and a timeline of privacy and libraries documents key developments in privacy culture in the US. Findings from an original exploratory survey of privacy literacy instruction practices in academic libraries are discussed. The survey identifies the rationales, topics, contexts, methods, and assessments academic librarians use in delivering privacy literacy instruction, as well as barriers against privacy literacy that they encounter. The article concludes with a case study explicating the authors’ own privacy literacy instruction experiences, and specific recommendations for overcoming the barriers to delivering privacy literacy instruction in academic libraries identified in the survey findings.

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Encouraging patron adoption of privacy-protection technologies:

Cited by 11 publications

References 23 publications

Awareness, Adoption, and Misconceptions of Web Privacy Tools

Awareness, Adoption, and Misconceptions of Web Privacy Tools

Emotional and Practical Considerations Towards the Adoption and Abandonment of VPNs as a Privacy-Enhancing Technology

Privacy literacy instruction practices in academic libraries: Past, present, and possibilities

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