Abstract
In this research in progress, we investigated the effects of mobile applications’ permission requests and their popularity among users. We collected data from 7959 Android apps on the Android app market across different application categories, and examined apps’ permission requests, number of downloads, and users’ ratings. We noted that permission requests that have privacy intrusion concerns influence apps ratings to different extents. For requests that have privacy intrusion concerns and can be easily noted by users, such as requests to camera, users increase the number of unfavourable one star rating’s. For requests that have privacy intrusion concerns but cannot be easily noted by users, such as request to read contacts, the influences on user ratings are not significant. The findings reveal that users are at a disadvantaged position as they may not be aware of privacy intrusions when the request involves actions by the app that cannot be observed by users. To further understand users’ decision process, we plan to conduct interviews and an experiment, in which we will prime users’ privacy concerns.
Recommended Citation
Zhang, Yixin and Garcia, Ryan Gilbert, "Do users really care about privacy? Mobile applications’ popularity, user satisfaction, and permission requests" (2020). ECIS 2020 Research-in-Progress Papers. 47.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/ecis2020_rip/47
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