Project info
- Developer Kayleigh Skye Gall
- Showcase year 2021
- Programme Ethical Hacking
Synopsis
Technology-facilitated abuse, or 'tech abuse', is the use of technology to coerce, stalk or harass another person. Whereas most efforts to tackle tech abuse thus far have been made through raising awareness and training for support service workers, I believe that technologists and smart home device vendors have a responsibility to ensure their products are secure.
This project explores smart home devices that are being abused and uses this to develop a framework which implements countermeasures to these methods. The framework considers the use of artificial intelligence to identify patterns of abuse between users of smart home devices and provides access to support for victims.
A prototype application was developed in Android Studio to visualise this framework.
A Study into Technical Countermeasures to Smart Home Technology-Facilitated Abuse
Exploring how IoT devices in the home are abused to coerce, stalk and harass victims of technology-facilitated abuse, and what technical countermeasures can be implemented against this.
Motivation
I first came across the concept of technology-facilitated abuse in a talk I attended at Abertay Ethical Hacking Society. It immediately peaked my interest as both the 'Internet of Things' and the social impacts of emerging technology are areas which fascinate me.
Upon further research into tech abuse, I was shocked that I hadn't known about it earlier and disturbed by how little active effort appeared to be going into preventing it. I felt a responsibility to do as much as I could to contribute to the efforts being made to research and prevent the abuse of hundreds of thousands of people using technology designed to improve lives.
Credits
“A Study into Technical Countermeasures to Smart Home Technology-Facilitated Abuse” is a 2021 Digital Graduate Show project by Kayleigh Skye Gall, a Ethical Hacking student at Abertay University.
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