Fong, Philip W. L.Tarameshloo, Ebrahim2016-10-052016-10-0520162016Tarameshloo, E. (2016). Privacy in Geo-social Networking Systems (Doctoral thesis, University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada). Retrieved from https://prism.ucalgary.ca. doi:10.11575/PRISM/27436http://hdl.handle.net/11023/3408With the proliferation of the Internet and GPS enabled smartphones, Geo-Social Computing Systems (GSCS) have seen widespread adoption. Facebook, Twitter, Waze, Geofeedia, WeLink are among the many GSCS with various members and services. These systems rapidly gained traction for two types of target users, a) GSCS members (data contributors), and b) GSCS data consumers.Although GSCS deliver valuable services, they also generate a host of privacy challenges. Protecting members' identity and their location information is a notable challenge in GSCS. Close examination of nine real life GSCS applications enabled me to identify four major challenges that can lead to insufficient privacy protection for members of GSCS. Unregulated access, policy conformity, privacy in publishing GSCS data, and data utility in published data are the focus of the challenges. Contributions of this thesis can be categorized into two main perspectives within the identified challenges. First, privacy of members inside the geo-social computing systems and second, privacy of members when these systems publish members' data. In each identified privacy challenge, I proposed an approach to address the challenge, and developed my designed approaches to demonstrate a tangible solution for each challenge. The results of this research provide knowledge that can help other researchers to recognize and address more privacy concerns in the GSNSs environment. This knowledge includes insight into theory and practice of privacy within the context of access control models, policy enforcement in a federated environment, privacy attacks and countermeasures in published data, and analytic tools for privacy experts.engUniversity of Calgary graduate students retain copyright ownership and moral rights for their thesis. You may use this material in any way that is permitted by the Copyright Act or through licensing that has been assigned to the document. For uses that are not allowable under copyright legislation or licensing, you are required to seek permission.Computer SciencePrivacySocial NetworkVisualizationAccess ControlAnalyticsLocation based social networkAnonymizationdoctoral thesishttp://dx.doi.org/10.11575/PRISM/27436