Privacy risk awareness and the behavior of smartwatch users: A case study of Indiana University students

The next big entrant into the interconnected family of the Internet of Things (IoT) is the smartwatch, which brings together a range of functionalities hitherto provided separately by traditional watch and the smartphone. While a lot of studies have focused on the technical/security aspects of the smartwatch, not much attention has been given to the user and privacy aspects of the smartwatch. In this work, we begin an exploratory user study aimed at assessing the privacy-awareness of American College students, their attitude towards privacy, and how that level of awareness and their privacy attitudes factor into their smartwatch-related privacy-enhancing behavior. For this study, we focus on the IUB student community as a starting point. This study has far-reaching implications for the evaluation of smartwatch-related privacy issues, as it highlights the importance and significance of the role of the user. The user perspectives highlighted will also better serve the needs of the smartwatch design community.