User Perceptions of Smart Home IoT Privacy

Abstract

Smart home Internet of Things (IoT) devices are rapidly increasing in popularity, with more households including Internet-connected devices that continuously monitor user activities. In this study, we conduct eleven semi-structured interviews with smart home owners, investigating their reasons for purchasing IoT devices, perceptions of smart home privacy risks, and actions taken to protect their privacy from those external to the home who create, manage, track, or regulate IoT devices and/or their data. We note several recurring themes. First, users' desires for convenience and connectedness dictate their privacy-related behaviors for dealing with external entities, such as device manufacturers, Internet Service Providers, governments, and advertisers. Second, user opinions about external entities collecting smart home data depend on perceived benefit from these entities. Third, users trust IoT device manufacturers to protect their privacy but do not verify that these protections are in place. Fourth, users are unaware of privacy risks from inference algorithms operating on data from non-audio/visual devices. These findings motivate several recommendations for device designers, researchers, and industry standards to better match device privacy features to the expectations and preferences of smart home owners.CCS Concepts: • Security and privacy → Human and societal aspects of security and privacy; • Human-centered computing → Empirical studies in HCI ; Ubiquitous and mobile devices;

I Spy with my Little Sensor Eye - Effect of Data-Tracking and Convenience on the Intention to Use Smart Technology.

“…Here, our findings demonstrate the importance of convenience of smart technology for its application in private households. This supports previous findings from Zheng and colleagues [8] who identified convenience as the driving factor in the usage of smart devices and substantiates the striving of manufacturers to create smart technology in a most comfortable way [11]. In their analysis, Yoon and Kim [12] revealed that convenience highly correlated with perceived usefulness of a smart device and that both factors are related to technology acceptance.…”

“…Examples for smart, convenience providing technology are smart phones managing our daily habits, intelligent loudspeakers ordering new detergents on command or smart robotic vacuum cleaners saving effort and time. Zheng and colleagues [8] confirm convenience as the driving force behind the usage of smart devices.…”

“…Nevertheless, the number of smart devices in private households is increasing [8] indicating that people weigh worries about their privacy against anticipated benefits of smart technology utilization. This is addressed by the privacy calculus theory [9] describing the trade-off between perceived risks and benefits of providing personal information.…”

The Living Room of the Future

“…It was suggested in discussion of this paper that its findings are culturally limited; that the same issues would not be surfaced in the US or Asia, where people are less concerned with what happens to their data. Whether or not this is true is, of course, a matter for empirical investigation, though initial studies with regard to the IoT suggest that, while differences exist, matters are not so clear cut in the US at least(Zheng et al 2018). …”

Defence Against Dark Artefacts: An Analysis of the Assumptions Underpinning Smart Home Cybersecurity Standards

“…The study showed that homes can be unsafe spaces, in particular for people who are traditionally marginalised or considered to be at risk [23]. The latter are often reticent to take part in research related to connected devices, which makes manufacturers and the research community not aware of the harms those devices can cause when they end up being controlled by the wrong person [24,25]. Furthermore, those who share access to devices may also be a threat to others in the home [26].…”