I’m going to start highlighting some of the research coming out of the #HCI lab I’m in at Vanderbilt that focuses on teen online safety that may provide insights to inform product and development work on Nostr.

In 2022, Dr. Akter led a project where teens and parents installed software on their respective smartphones that allowed them to see what apps were on each other’s phones and view their respective privacy and security settings. Here’s what she and the team found:

- Teens are (perhaps not surprisingly) much more aware of data privacy risks with respect to third-party apps than their parents (many teens were shocked and dismayed by what they saw as poor data and device security and privacy management by their parents)

- Parents were less concerned about privacy and security settings and much more worried about apps that allowed teens to message others (especially adults) the parents didn’t know

- Teens felt uncomfortable monitoring their parents and upending the parent/teen power dynamic, but had much more productive communication about device and internet use as a result of being aware of each other’s apps and settings

Food for thought:

- How can we better educate users about privacy and security on Nostr?

- How can we make the settings in our apps simple and straightforward for less privacy- and security- savvy users?

- How can we encourage more community dialogue about privacy and security from a practical (rather than just philosophical or ideological) perspective?

Citation:

Akter, Mamtaj, Godfrey, Amy J., Kropczynski, Jess, Lipford, Heather R. & Wisniewski, Pamela J.. 2022. From parental control to joint family oversight: Can parents and teens manage mobile online safety and privacy as equals?. Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction 6: 1-28. doi: 10.1145/3512904.