Privacy Mediation Cards

The Privacy Mediation Cards are a deck of 34 cards that assist with designing privacy mediating procedures for ubiquitous body-worn cameras.

Why privacy mediation?

On the one hand using personal, body-worn cameras can be great fun. On the other hand, these “always-on” cameras are not well accepted in social situations, as they may cause discomfort and social tension, and even intrude other‘s privacy.
Ensuring privacy in the context of body-worn cameras means that bystanders should have the right and ability to choose when, where, and by whom they are recorded.
Various technologies can facilitate this process by mediating between camera user and bystanders. We call this Privacy Mediation.

This card deck

This card deck - the Privacy Mediation Cards - introduces technologies and principles that can be put together to create privacy mediating procedures for various kinds of body-worn devices with an integrated camera.
This card deck helps teams of designers and developers to broaden their thinking, and develop solutions for socially adequate usage of body-worn cameras that go beyond making a binary decision for either banning or allowing these devices. On the long run this shall aid to smooth the adoption of body-worn camera technologies and make it more considerate to the stakeholders involved.

Where and how to start?

The 34 Privacy Mediation Cards are structured in 6 categories: Communication, Visibility, Participation, Enforcement, Implementation, and Responsibility. There is no predefined order or hierarchy.
Each card has two sides:
One concept side, presenting a technology, principle or concept that answers to a design question.
One impulses side, presenting potential problems or questions, and pointing to card categories with potential answers.
Two exemplary ways to start are:

1. Explorative: start from any one of the impulses cards, and explore the linked categories.
2. Problem-oriented: start from a problem you encountered with your product, prototype or design. Explore the solution space by spreading all cards (e.g., on a table). Then, pick one concept and start exploring alternatives (e.g., from the same category) or extensions.

Keep cards with concepts you like, discard those you don‘t. In the end, use these cards to design one or more solutions to be further discussed.