Institute of Art Design + Technology Dún Laoghaire
Ireland’s campus for the Creative Industries

Rory Bradley 

MSc User Experience Design

I am a lecturer on the BA (Hons) in Graphic Design at IADT. I teach typography, image-making, design thinking, UX, UI and motion design. I have nearly a decade of industry experience working at a prestigious design studio in Dublin. I also currently maintain a small personal practice.

Trust when we are living inside a computer

The Internet of Things can provide a range of benefits to society, from better managing resource consumption to increased security and health care. For this technology to grow and achieve widespread adoption, consumers must sufficiently trust it. While data privacy is not yet mainstream, technology companies current data extraction practices through smart devices are causing growing concern. Researchers, designers and governments have put forward proposals to inform people of the implications of using these devices. A recurring proposal is a personalised privacy assistant (PPA).


Research Objectives

This paper identifies a gap in research around privacy issues and trust for IoT devices. It examines emerging PPA technology to help users manage their privacy preferences in a smart home environment. It then used design thinking and user-centred design methodologies to explore and design a PPA prototype. N=41 participants tested this to gauge their levels of trust and elicit their opinions on such a technology


Project Outcomes

This project contributed to understanding people's attitudes towards smart home data through quantitive and qualitative research methods. It has tested a prototype PPA with people and identified key hurdles such a system would need to overcome. It has also contributed towards designing a more human-centred approach to data management.