Symposium Program:

 

Thursday, October 14th

8:30AM – 9:15AM

Registration and Continental Breakfast

9:15AM – 9:30AM

Opening Remarks: Dr. Katherine Strandburg, J.D., Assistant Professor, CIPLIT

9:30AM – 11:45AM

TOPIC #1: Biometrics and Facial Recognition (DePaul Center, Room 8005)

Moderator: Dr. Daniela Raicu, Assistant Professor, CTI
Professor Ishwar K. Sethi, Department Chair, Computer Science and Engineering Department, Oakland University, "Biometrics: Challenges and Applications", Presentation (PPT ~ 1.5 MB)
Dr. Dongge Li, Senior Staff Research Engineer, Motorola Multimedia Communications Labs, Schaumburg, IL, "Biometric Research and Technology: Survey and Case Study"
Professor Lisa Nelson, Univ. of Pittsburgh, "Constructing Policy – Protections, Privacy and Biometrics"
Dr. Ann Cavoukian, Information and Privacy Commissioner, Ontario, Canada, "Biometrics and the Privacy Paradox"
, Presentation (PPT ~ 826 KB)

11:45AM - NOON

Break

NOON – 1:15PM

Niro Lecture and Luncheon: Professor Pamela Samuelson, Professor of Law and Information Management; Chancellor's Professor; Director, Berkeley Center for Law & Technology; University of California, Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law, "Is Privacy Possible in Pervasive Computing Environments?"

1:15PM – 3:45PM

TOPIC #2: RFID and Location Tracking (DePaul Center, Room 8005)

Moderator: Dr. Katherine Strandburg, J.D., Assistant Professor, CIPLIT

Dr. Ari Juels, Principal Research Scientist, Manager of Applied Research, RSA Laboratories, "RFID Privacy: a Technical Perspective"
Professor Mark Monmonier, Distinguished Professor of Geography, Syracuse University, "Geographic Aspects of Location Tracking with RFID and GPS"
, Presentation (PPT ~ 54 KB)
Deborah Caldwell-Stone, Deputy Director, Intellectual Freedom Office, American Library Association, "Libraries, User Privacy, and RFID."
Professor Paul M. Schwartz, Brooklyn Law School
Professor Jonathan Weinberg, Wayne State University School of Law, "Thinking about RFID"

3:45PM – 4:00PM

Coffee Break

4:00PM– 6:00PM

Contributed Papers

7:00PM

Cocktails: Union League Club, 65 W. Jackson Blvd.

7:30PM

Conference Banquet: Union League Club, 65 W. Jackson Blvd.
Dinner Speaker: Thomas R. Mulroy, Partner, McGuire Woods LLP, Chicago, IL, "Privacy Perils in the Courtroom - Real Life Adventures Not Found on Television"


Friday, October 15th

8:00AM – 8:30AM

Continental Breakfast

8:30AM – 10:30AM

TOPIC #3: Data Mining and Data Aggregation (DePaul Center, Room 8005)

Moderator: Dr. Bamshad Mobasher, Associate Professor, CTI
Prof. Raghu Ramakrishnan, University of Wisconsin, Madison, "Data Mining: Good, Bad, or just a Tool?"
Professor Christopher Clifton, Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, "Turning Data into Knowledge Without Violating Privacy"
Professor Daniel J. Solove, George Washington University Law School, "Privacy and the Digital Person"
Professor Peter Swire, Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, former Chief Counselor for Privacy, USOMB, "Inside the MATRIX: Fair Information Practices in a World of Data Mining"

10:30AM – 11:00 AM

TOPIC #4:  Anonymity and Authentication (DePaul Center, Room 8005)

Moderator: Professor Roberta Kwall

Professor Ian Kerr, Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa, Canada, "DOGNYMITY", Presentation (PPT ~ 5.9 MB)

11:00AM – 11:15AM

Coffee Break

11:15AM-1:00PM

Contributed Papers

 

Abstracts

Professor Ishwar K. Sethi, Department Chair, Computer Science and Engineering Department, Oakland University, "Biometrics: Challenges and Applications"

This talk will provide an overview of biometrics from a technical perspective and addresses challenges facing the biometric system’s designers from technical and societal perspectives.

 

Dr. Dongge Li, Senior Staff Research Engineer, Motorola Multimedia Communications Labs, Schaumburg, IL, "Biometric Research and Technology: Survey and Case Study"

This talk will give a snapshot of the landscape in biometrics. Different biometric techniques will be firstly discussed and compared. How do them work and when do them fail? What are the merits and demerits of different biometric techniques and how to improve over existing technology? Our discussion will then focus on a couple of specific biometric research topics, in particular, face detection and recognition technology and its applications in security and surveillance. I will discuss the face detection and recognition system we developed in Motorola Labs. If time permits, I will give a live demonstration of this system at the end of the presentation.
 

Professor Lisa Nelson, Univ. of Pittsburgh, "Constructing Policy – Protections, Privacy and Biometrics"

The creation of privacy legislation specific to biometric identifiers must answer the threshold question of whether it is a replication or duplication of existing legislation. The specific privacy protections afforded under the auspices of the Constitution and statutory legislation are certainly applicable to biometric identifiers. The question, however, is how effective is the existing legislation in combating consumer fears and protecting privacy? Existing legislation must be evaluated not according to its own terms but to the standards of protection that it seeks to uphold. New legislative efforts then must strive to achieve the principles of protective legislation already in place while overcoming overcome its shortcomings in practice. The question considered in this paper is whether biometric identifier privacy legislation is necessary given protections afforded by existing Constitutional and legislative protections. This paper also considers how proposed privacy protections – including consent and procedural due process guarantees – might apply to the deployment of biometric technology.

 

Professor Mark Monmonier, Distinguished Professor of Geography, Syracuse University, "Geographic Aspects of Location Tracking with RFID and GPS"
Radio frequency identification (RFID) and geographical positioning system (GPS) technologies offer potentially complementary strategies to the problem of determining instantaneous location and tracking people, vehicles, or merchandise. An RFID system can record location when a subject with an RFID tag passes within range of a compatible reader, and an RFID unit with read-write memory and the ability to record location identifiers from low-power transmitters along its path could be debriefed periodically by a system design to reconstruct the subject’s route. Whereas RFID tracking requires readers positioned at appropriate choke points in a circulation network, GPS allows continuous tracking, especially if linked in real-time to the wireless telephone system—the preferred method of satisfying the federally mandated E-911 positioning requirement. But because of signal attenuation and multipath-corrupted signals in buildings and urban canyons, GPS does not guarantee reliable, uninterrupted tracking. These technical difficulties suggest that an amalgamation of RFID and GPS solutions could pose a significantly greater threat to locational privacy than either technology deployed independently. Privacy issues raised by GPS tracking and its amalgamation with RFID include retention period, the ownership of an individual’s locational history, and a “track-me” button that would extend “opt-in” protection to cell-telephone users. Potential for abuse heightens concern about locational privacy as a basic right.  For the presentation slides in PDF format, please click here
.

 

Professor Ian Kerr, Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa, Canada, "DOGNYMITY"

A number of proponents of individual freedom have, in the post 9/11 era, recanted the view that anonymity is part of the bedrock of a free and democratic society. The advent of various new technologies further undermines the possibility of disconnecting our identities from our actions. Is anonymity going to the dogs?
In this presentation, Professor Ian Kerr discusses the recent assault on anonymity, followed by a description of a large multi-disciplinary, Canadian-based research initiative that studies the importance and impact of anonymity and authentication in a networked society.

 

Professor Pamela Samuelson, Professor of Law and Information Management; Chancellor's Professor; Director, Berkeley Center for Law & Technology; University of California, Berkeley Boalt Hall School of Law, "Is Privacy Possible in Pervasive Computing Environments?"
As computing devices designed to sense physical phenomena become tinier, more capable of internal power generation, and better able to broadcast data and self-organize in networks, pervasive computing environments employing sensor networks may become the “next new thing.” Motes embedded in the tires of your car may be programmed, for example, to let you know if the tire pressure is low; those embedded in the walls of your home may adjust heat and/or lighting systems to minimize electrical consumption; and those deployed in public squares may detect pollution levels or other hazardous contaminants and transmit signals to warning systems as needed.
The United States presently has no legal infrastructure to safeguard privacy interests of individuals in data sensor networks may gather and process about them. While fair information practices have provided a general framework for information privacy in the online world (e.g., informing firms about constructing privacy policies for their websites), these practices may be difficult to map onto sensor network technology. Fair information practices, for example, typically require notice to persons affected that information about them is being collected and for what purpose, as well as consent to collection of the data for such a purpose. As sensors become pervasively embedded in every day life, notice and consent may no longer be feasible.
This presentation will explore the role legislation and policy ought to play in protecting information privacy of persons in sensor network environments and in regulating the technologies that enable surveillance of persons via sensor networks. Developers should be encouraged, and perhaps even required, to build some privacy-protection capabilities into sensor network technologies in order to preserve the important social values information privacy protects.

 

Prof. Raghu Ramakrishnan, University of Wisconsin, Madison, "Data Mining: Good, Bad, or just a Tool?"

There is significant value to society in developing the science underpinning data mining, but also significant risk for misuse of the technology. The same techniques that could accurately identify malignant tumors could be used to classify individuals as potential terrorists, and the medical information that can be used to help doctors in emergency situations can also be used for invasive marketing. What should our response be? To disallow data mining altogether? To only apply it to “non-controversial” areas? To accept some risk if the need is acute or the benefits are compelling? If our response is to develop data mining techniques and to apply them with care when appropriate or necessary, what checks and balances are required in order to safeguard individual rights? How can we constrain when and to what ends the technology is applied, and how the results are interpreted? What are the parallels to existing legal protections? What are the differences that make the problem of electronic privacy more challenging?
Appreciating the distinction between developing data mining techniques and of collecting specific kinds of data and applying these techniques with specific objectives will allow us to focus our attention on the appropriate checks and balances for responsible use of the technology.
 

 

Professor Christopher Clifton, Department of Computer Science, Purdue University, "Turning Data into Knowledge Without Violating Privacy"

The confluence of data mining, large databases, and networked information sources opens a wealth of possibilities for knowledge discovery. Privacy and security concerns have lead to a backlash against these technologies, witness the introduction in the U.S. Senate of the "Data-Mining Moratorium Act of 2003". The irony is that most data mining generates summary results that do not violate privacy. Are we simply facing a need to educate the public on what data mining really is? The answer is no: the problem is real. It isn't data mining that is at fault, but gathering the data into a common warehouse to enable data mining. In general, problem arises when data must be shared.
This talk discusses how privacy-preserving data mining and other privacy-preserving collaboration techniques can enable applications that might otherwise be prevented due to privacy concerns, and what research issues to be addressed before these technologies can become reality.
 

Professor Daniel J. Solove, George Washington University Law School, "Privacy and the Digital Person"

Professor Solove will discuss some of the central ideas of his forthcoming book, THE DIGITAL PERSON: TECHNOLOGY AND PRIVACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE (NYU Press, Dec. 1, 2004). The book examines the threat to privacy caused by the gathering of personal information in gigantic computer databases. Massive quantities of data about individuals are being used to make important decisions in their lives, and the government is increasingly tapping into companies' databases to monitor and profile people. Solove examines why these developments are problematic and why the law has thus far failed to respond adequately. He proposes a way to reconceptualize information privacy in order to guide the creation of effective regulation of data collection and use.

 

 


 
Last modified: November 26, 2004