Stanford Center for Internet and Society

I've blogged before about the impact of anthropomorphic interfaces and devices. I've recently written an article on the subject. In it I point out that we're using voice-driven and other human-like interfaces more and more. They grab our attention and free up our hands for others tasks. And they can help us accept machines---such as personal or service robots---for a whole new set of tasks.

Psychologists and communications scholars will tell you, however, that our brains are hardwired to treat these "fake" people as though they were real, including with respect to the feeling of being observed and evaluated. That means that we react to such technology, behaviorally and physiologically, as though a person were really present.

This could be bad for privacy. Privacy scholars will tell you that its not good for us to always feel like we're surrounded by others. We need "moments offstage," to use Alan Westin's famous formulation. It could also be good for privacy, particularly on the Internet. Using avatars instead of privacy policies that no one reads or understands could help shore up the failing regime of online notice.

You can view the article here. As of today, it's looking for a good home.

Calls to better safeguard users' privacy online and improve protection of personal data on the Internet are commonplace. The concerns about privacy issues are sometimes coupled with demanding higher legal standards of protection pertaining to access and use of personal data obtained over the Internet by third parties, may they be the government and its agencies or private entities that collect and use personal data for commercial purposes. Professors Michael Birnhack (Tel Aviv University) and Niva Elkin-Koren (University of Haifa) have just posted a new and highly interesting study that addresses questions of compliance with privacy regulation in Israel.

The California Department of Insurance (DOI) is considering regulations that would enable insurance prices to depend on the precise number of miles a car is driven in a given billing period.

I’ve blogged before about the Network Advertising Initiative’s opt out for behavioral targeting, noting that there is no guarantee that participants will stop tracking users (only that they will stop serving targeted ads with the data they gather). Now a distinct coalition of online advertisers has proposed its own self-regulatory program, modeled on principles released (PDF) by Federal Trade Commission staff earlier this year. I took a closer look at what the new industry program says about opting out of the collection of user browsing habits. Hint: pay close attention to the use of conjunctions.