Online Privacy Behavioral Study

Tem Members

Carlos Aguila

Brooke Guerrero

Christopher Mostello

Leslie Smith

My Contribution

Affinity Diagram

Interviews

Observations

Personas

Persona Spectrum

Scenarios

Survey

Issue

Many people are unsure of how to protect their personal information online. In many instances, internet users do not even know that their information is collected for targeted ads and other various reasons. My team sought to get a better understanding of people’s practices and attitudes in regards to online privacy.

Process

Our team conducted three studies with a total of 53 participants. First, we observed six participants complete simple privacy setting tasks with Google user ad settings. Second, we conducted in-depth interviews with five participants around privacy and personal information. Lastly, we administered a survey regarding actions people take when visiting websites and using mobile applications. Using these research methods we were able to observe and determine if users do, in fact, know how to set their privacy settings and protect their information. 

Outcome

From our results, we found that many users were hesitant to attempt to safeguard their privacy because they felt there was no quick fix to the issue and any available solutions seemed too difficult to complete. We brainstormed possible design solutions to the problems identified during this study. One solution is a browser extension that identifies when users are signing up for a new service, then simplifies the site’s terms of service, and provides the user with customized suggestions on what not to share for that particular site.