Paper Type
Research-in-Progress Paper
Abstract
Facebook as the world’s leading online social network (OSN), provides a platform for third party providers to offer applications (OSN Apps). Most often, using OSN Apps is linked to members granting access rights to personal OSN data. This raises privacy concerns which can ultimately prevent members from using those Apps – although, in general, they might be interested in App functionalities. Current literature on OSN privacy does not take into account the specifics of OSN Apps. Apps can, for instance, post on behalf of users or leak data to third party providers. Based on 17 qualitative interviews, the paper provides grounded insights into the trade-off between privacy concerns and benefits associated with the usage of Apps. Thereby we extend current literature on OSN privacy protection and provide a basis for deriving “Privacy by Design” requirements of OSN in order to maintain prospective and privacy-friendly OSN App ecosystems.
Recommended Citation
Schreiber, Tobias; Deuker, André; Albers, Andreas; and Neves, Mickel, "The Privacy Trade-Off: App Usage on OSN" (2013). AMCIS 2013 Proceedings. 5.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/amcis2013/VirtualCommunities/RoundTablePresentations/5
The Privacy Trade-Off: App Usage on OSN
Facebook as the world’s leading online social network (OSN), provides a platform for third party providers to offer applications (OSN Apps). Most often, using OSN Apps is linked to members granting access rights to personal OSN data. This raises privacy concerns which can ultimately prevent members from using those Apps – although, in general, they might be interested in App functionalities. Current literature on OSN privacy does not take into account the specifics of OSN Apps. Apps can, for instance, post on behalf of users or leak data to third party providers. Based on 17 qualitative interviews, the paper provides grounded insights into the trade-off between privacy concerns and benefits associated with the usage of Apps. Thereby we extend current literature on OSN privacy protection and provide a basis for deriving “Privacy by Design” requirements of OSN in order to maintain prospective and privacy-friendly OSN App ecosystems.