Context-aware privacy protection with profile management

Abstract

Hotspot services will be offered in small, highly-populated public places like airports, hospitals, etc. They will play their assistive roles in the people's life only if they are secure, trusted, and nonobtrusive. Some of the challenges faced are the seamless operation between WLAN-based hotspots and other emerging wireless data networks technologies, for example body sensor networks; the exploitation of context- and location-aware information provided from the hotspot service; matching the user needs with differentiated services; preserving the privacy of the user's sensitive data and anonymity. To answer these challenges, a new solution for context-aware privacy protection for any type of fine-grained user sensitive data with profiles of the user, context, scenario and service is proposed. Based on assessment of current context and situation, the user delegates actions for protecting his privacy to the proposed mechanism that acts on his behalf. The discussed solution is presented with a medical scenario. Components model, interaction sequence, algorithm for privacy safeguarding and system implementation are described.