THRIDI design workshop – call for participants

IoT systems in smart homes present several privacy challenges. While GDPR creates a general duty for data controllers to implement privacy by default and privacy by design, this obligation requires taking into account the state-of-the-art. However, the state-of-the-art in the smart home context is in its infancy, requiring research into building accountability and trust via the appropriate design of user interface and access control systems. To this end, the THRIDI project aims to foster collaboration within an interdisciplinary community in a design workshop in November on the following topics:

* How to ensure end-user engagement for dynamic and on-demand creation of data-sharing policies in smart homes.
* How to tackle users’ lack of knowledge of security and privacy and their experience with managing their devices.
* How to avoid privacy fatigue while ensuring appropriate levels of user agency.
* How to manage shared ownership and control of objects.
* How to ensure regulatory compliance.
* How regulation on consumer IoT products and data protection can support technical and design standards that are genuinely privacy-friendly to and usable by end-users.

The workshop will aim to create a free-thinking and collaborative environment, involving 25-30 participants using online collaboration and communication tools. All participation in the workshop will be recorded and transcribed. Selected participants may indicate at a later stage if they would like to opt in to be referred to by name in a research report concerning this study.

We expect the workshop to be especially suited to researchers in academia, industry, and public sector specialising in IoT, network security, privacy-enhancing technologies, user interface design, law, and policy. We are looking for researchers who enjoy stepping outside their area of expertise or interest, enjoy creative activities and teamwork. The workshop requires you to brainstorm and apply design thinking to different scenarios with other researchers you may not know. We aim to chart out some of the challenges in this space and come up with initial ideas of design solutions that may underpin future collaborative opportunities.

As the workshop will be run fully online, we expect participants to have access to a laptop and broadband Internet connection. Please indicate if there are any limitations to your participation, and we will aim to assist the best we can.

Key dates:
Call launched: August 13
Call closes: October 15
Participant selection: November 1
Workshop: November 19-20

For more information contact either:

Cigdem Sengul

Arthi Manohar

Jiahong Chen

*Funded by EPSRC HDI Network; IoT, System Design, and the Law funding call.
*This research has been approved by the College of Engineering, Design, and Physical Sciences Research Ethics Committee.