An Architecture for Privacy-Sensitive Ubiquitous Computing

Privacy is the most often-cited criticism of ubiquitous computing, and may be the greatest barrier to its long-term success. However, developers currently have little support in designing software architectures and in creating interactions that are effective in helping end-users manage their privacy. To address this problem, we present Confab, a toolkit for facilitating the development of privacy-sensitive ubiquitous computing applications. The requirements for Confab were gathered through an analysis of privacy needs for both end-users and application developers. Confab provides basic support for building ubiquitous computing applications, providing a framework as well as several customizable privacy mechanisms. Confab also comes with extensions for managing location privacy. Combined, these features allow application developers and end-users to support a spectrum of trust levels and privacy needs. Categories and Subject Descriptors D.2.2 [Software Engineering]: Design Tools and Tech...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2004
• Where: MOBISYS
• Authors: Jason I. Hong, James A. Landay
• Keywords: Customizable Privacy Mechanisms, MOBISYS 2004, Privacy Needs, Ubiquitous Computing Applications, Wireless Networks