More privacy in the digital working world

Chat rooms and digital meetings in the home office: the boundary between the professional and private worlds is becoming increasingly blurred and privacy is being called into question by digital technology. Instead of banning technology, researchers at the University of Kassel are focusing on so-called "nudges" as part of the Nudger research project: small aids for smart behavior.

Workers are to be "nudged" to make better decisions for data protection. This is the idea behind the project "Nudging privacy in the digitalized world of work". "People often behave irrationally," explains project manager Dr. Andreas Janson from the Department of Information Systems at the University of Kassel. "Although we know exactly how much data we give out every day, we don't do anything about it ourselves."

The researchers developed a modular system with potential nudge solutions for digital business tools. "The solutions are often simple and their technical implementation straightforward, but the impact of such design options can be enormous," explains Janson. For example, data protection-compliant settings can be marked with signal colors or video conferences can be preset so that a person's background is no longer visible by default.

Similar systems already exist. Probably the best known is the consent to cookies, which is requested when a page is visited. "Cookie banners often have color elements that highlight the 'accept all cookies' option. In our opinion, however, the 'decline' option should be highlighted or at least given the same prominence. The default settings should be such that all cookies are initially deactivated and must be actively selected," explains project participant Sabrina Schomberg from the Department of Public Law, IT Law and Environmental Law at the University of Kassel. Janson adds: "If something is preset, users often simply nod it off. We use this behavior for positive purposes and to protect privacy."

In addition to technical questions, the project also dealt with ethical and legal issues. "Everyone is allowed to make bad decisions and so we dealt with the problem of paternalism," says Schomberg. "However, Art. 25 para. 2 GDPR requires data protection-friendly default settings. In this respect, we help with implementation. It is important to us that users still have the option to change their settings.

The project was funded by the BMBF with approx. 1.23 million euros. It was implemented by the University of Kassel, represented by the coordinating Department of Information Systems(Prof. Dr. Jan Marco Leimeister) and the Department of Public Law, IT Law and Environmental Law(Prof. Dr. Gerrit Hornung), Lyncronize GmbH (Dr. Philipp Bitzer, Dr. René Wegener) and the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO and Future Work Lab (Sven Schuler).