Skip to Main Content
Voices

Joseph K. Nwankpa in The Conversation: ‘Complicated app settings are a threat to user privacy’

The associate professor of Information Systems and Analytics looks at using default privacy settings in popular mobile apps

Voices

Joseph K. Nwankpa in The Conversation: ‘Complicated app settings are a threat to user privacy’

Using default privacy settings in popular mobile apps may “seem like a convenience, allowing you to use a single setting to control the level of privacy – who can see which actions you take – across all of the app’s functions. But default privacy settings are also a potential risk to your privacy,” writes Joseph K. Nwankpa, associate professor of Information Systems and Analytics.

“The U.S. app market generated US$44.9 billion in 2023, with smartphone users spending 217 billion hours on their apps. The growing popularity of mobile apps can be attributed to their convenience, ease of use, connectivity and flexibility,” Nwankpa writes.

A cybersecurity scholar, Nwankpa has found that privacy settings in many apps can make end users more vulnerable to data exposure, despite being presented as enabling privacy. Read Nwankpa’s article “Complicated app settings are a threat to user privacy” in The Conversation.