Collaborative Research: CIRC: Planning-C: Building a Safer Cyberspace by Creating a Centralized Research Infrastructure to Track and Mitigate Privacy Harms

This project explores a proof-of-concept and feasibility evaluation to inform the future development of a centralized data repository to support the privacy research community. The repository will enable tracking and systematic study of privacy harms. Current incident reporting systems are designed to track the occurrence of large-scale data breaches, but there is currently no centralized reporting system to effectively track other types of privacy violations (e.g., online harassment, cyber abuse) that negatively impact end-users. Without access to this information, it is difficult to quantify / qualify how and to what extent different online platforms propagate privacy breaches, as well as how to redesign such systems to be more secure and trustworthy. Therefore, this planning effort aims to (1) solicit the opinions of privacy experts on the design of the repository; (2) prototype the repository and solicit feedback from experts piloting it; and (3) build on these learnings to develop a plan to develop a centralized privacy incident repository. This will ultimately enable researchers to work together to (1) identify and prioritize privacy harms and the factors associated with the incidents; (2) understand how various populations are impacted by these harms; and (3) develop and evaluate potential interventions. This repository is envisioned to support the protection of vulnerable end-users who are disproportionately threatened and harmed by digital privacy violations, addressing the recent R&D budget priority from the White House and the Office of Science and Technology Policy focused on reducing inequities. By identifying evolving privacy risks, we also work towards two other budget priorities -- advancing trustworthy AI technology and maintaining global security and stability. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.