TY - GEN
T1 - PowerCut and obfuscator
T2 - 17th Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security, SOUPS 2021
AU - Chandrasekaran, Varun
AU - Banerjee, Suman
AU - Mutlu, Bilge
AU - Fawaz, Kassem
N1 - Funding Information:
We would like to thank Christopher Little and Thomas Linden who helped with the interviews. We would also like to thank Mariam Fawaz who assisted with the photographs of the interventions, and Yilong Li who assisted with the fabrication of Obfuscator. Finally, we would like to thank the anonymous reviewers and our shepherd for their constructive feedback. Varun, Suman, and Kassem were supported in part through the following US NSF grants: CNS-1838733, CNS-1719336, CNS-1647152, CNS-1629833, CNS-1942014, and CNS-2003129 and an award from the US Department of Commerce with award number 70NANB21H043.
Publisher Copyright:
© is held by the author/owner. Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee. +USENIX Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security (SOUPS) 2021.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - The pervasive use of smart speakers has raised numerous privacy concerns. While work to date provides an understanding of user perceptions of these threats, limited research focuses on how we can mitigate these concerns, either through redesigning the smart speaker or through dedicated privacy-preserving interventions. In this paper, we present the design and prototyping of two privacy-preserving interventions: 'Obfuscator' targeted at disabling recording at the microphones, and 'PowerCut' targeted at disabling power to the smart speaker. We present our findings from a technology probe study involving 24 households that interacted with our prototypes; the primary objective was to gain a better understanding of the design space for technological interventions that might address these concerns. Our data and findings reveal complex trade-offs among utility, privacy, and usability and stresses the importance of multi-functionality, aesthetics, ease-of-use, and form factor. We discuss the implications of our findings for the development of subsequent interventions and the future design of smart speakers.
AB - The pervasive use of smart speakers has raised numerous privacy concerns. While work to date provides an understanding of user perceptions of these threats, limited research focuses on how we can mitigate these concerns, either through redesigning the smart speaker or through dedicated privacy-preserving interventions. In this paper, we present the design and prototyping of two privacy-preserving interventions: 'Obfuscator' targeted at disabling recording at the microphones, and 'PowerCut' targeted at disabling power to the smart speaker. We present our findings from a technology probe study involving 24 households that interacted with our prototypes; the primary objective was to gain a better understanding of the design space for technological interventions that might address these concerns. Our data and findings reveal complex trade-offs among utility, privacy, and usability and stresses the importance of multi-functionality, aesthetics, ease-of-use, and form factor. We discuss the implications of our findings for the development of subsequent interventions and the future design of smart speakers.
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M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85114465859
T3 - Proceedings of the 17th Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security, SOUPS 2021
SP - 535
EP - 551
BT - Proceedings of the 17th Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security, SOUPS 2021
PB - USENIX Association
Y2 - 9 August 2021 through 10 August 2021
ER -