In this lightning talk, Rishab Nithyanand provides an overview of three tussles that have become increasingly important over the last few years: privacy versus accountability; free speech versus civility; and anonymity versus accountability. Nithyanand’s research focuses on the first one – the tension between privacy and profitability, and how this tension is playing out in the context of personally identifying information collected by smartphone apps.

Data & Society’s Fellows Talks is a three-part Databite series showcasing our 2017-2018 fellows cohort. Each talk features 2-3 fellows speaking about their work, wide-ranging interdisciplinary connections, and a few of the provocative questions that have emerged this year.

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Rishab Nithyanand is a 2017-18 Data & Society/Mozilla Open Web Fellow who enjoys research geared towards defending anonymity, understanding Internet censorship, measuring aspects of the advertising and tracking ecosystem, and generally understanding the impact of the Internet on the sociopolitical realities of today. In the past, he dabbled in usable security and computer theory. His PhD dissertation focused on building defenses for various attacks on the Tor anonymity network.

About Databites

Data & Society’s “Databites” speaker series presents timely conversations about the purpose and power of technology, bridging our interdisciplinary research with broader public conversations about the societal implications of data and automation.