Visualizing Privacy Implications of Access Control Policies in Social Network Systems

Abstract

We hypothesize that, in a Facebook-style social network system, proper visualization of one’s extended neighborhood could help the user understand the privacy implications of her access control policies. However, an unrestricted view of one’s extended neighborhood may compromise the privacy of others. To address this dilemma, we propose a privacy-enhanced visualization tool, which approximates the extended neighborhood of a user in such a way that policy assessment can still be conducted in a meaningful manner, while the privacy of other users is preserved.