privacy

National Academies Board on Human-System Integration

Heng Xu will join leaders in science, engineering, and industry to serve on the Board on Human-Systems Integration, National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine. The board was established in...

CES APA Panel on What Firms Need to Know about Privacy

Heng Xu joined a panel of experts hosted by the American Psychological Association (APA) at CES 2024 to discuss about what companies need to know about how people understand privacy....

Information privacy - Challenges and opportunities for technology and measurement

We recently published a book chapter, “Information privacy: Challenges and opportunities for technology and measurement”, in Technology and Measurement around the Globe edited by Drs. Louis Tay, Sang Eun Woo,...

Working Paper - Theorizing about the Complexity of Privacy Phenomena - A Configurational Approach

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, addressing challenges facing the theorization of complex privacy phenomena.

An Onto-Epistemological Analysis of Information Privacy Research

Privacy is one of the most urgent issues associated with the advancement of information technology. Yet, there is a growing concern that the issues surrounding privacy have been too complex...

Why Privacy Still Matters

In the December 2022 issue of MIS Quarterly, Heng Xu and Tamara Dinev co-wrote a reflection, “Why Privacy Still Matters”, for their 2011 publication that won the inaugural MIS Quaterly Impact Award in 2021.

Nature Forum on Empowering Data as a New Asset

In an upcoming Nature Conference, Forum on Empowering Data as A New Asset, Heng Xu will join a panel of industry leaders, data economists and policy makers to discuss about...

Talks at MPI Sympoisium

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang will speak at the Interdisciplinary Symposium on Human and Societal Aspects in Computing organized by the Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy on October 25-26, 2022, in Bochum, Germany.

Change Can't Wait San Francisco Panel on AI Governance

Professor Heng Xu joined a panel of experts to discuss AI Governance in the Change Can’t Wait San Francisco event on March 11, 2022.

Working Paper - Fairness of Ratemaking for Catastrophe Insurance

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Nan Zhang and Heng Xu, addressing the problem of fair ratemaking in catastrophe insurance.

MISQ Impact Award

Professor Heng Xu received the inaugural Impact Award from MIS Quarterly for her article “Information Privacy Research: An Interdisciplinary Review” (joint work with Tamara Dinev and the late H. Jeff Smith).

Privacy Measurement Project

We gratefully acknowledge Meta Research for their generous support of our project “Addressing biases in measurement of self-reported privacy constructs”, which was selected as part of the 2021 People’s Expectations...

From Contextualizing to Context-Theorizing

In an article forthcoming at Management Science, we developed a conceptual framework and its associated methodological instantiation for assessing how context-oriented nuances influence privacy concerns.

Woman of Achievement Award

Heng Xu received The Woman of Achievement Award from the IEEE International Conference on Big Data Security on Cloud, for her “substantial contributions either in research, product development or mentoring”...

RSA Conference Panel on "AI meets cybersecurity"

In an upcoming RSA Conference webcast, Heng Xu will join a panel of experts to discuss “AI meets cybersecurity: crossing the streams and how to manage the dynamic results”.

Implications of Anonymization on Disparity Detection

In an article forthcoming at Management Science, we examined the extent to which data anonymization could mask the gross statistical disparities between sub-populations in the data.

Panel on Using Sensitive Data to Counter Bias and Discrimination

Heng Xu, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, will join a panel of experts discussing the use of sensitive data in research to counter hidden bias and discrimination at the...

ITSS Leadership Award in Intelligence and Security Informatics

Heng Xu was awarded the IEEE Intelligent Transportation Systems Society (ITSS) Leadership Award in Intelligence and Security Informatics for 2021 for her “recognized sustained leadership in fields such as cybersecurity...

Upcoming Talk at UCSD Health

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, co-directors of the Robust Analytics Lab, will give a (virtual) presentation at the University of California San Diego Health Department of Biomedical Informatics (DBMI) lecture...

Working Paper - Implications of Data Anonymization on the Statistical Evidence of Disparity

We posted on SSRN a working paper by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, addressing the implications of data anonymization on the statistical evidence of disparity.

Facebook Live: COVID-19's Implications for Cybersecurity

Update: See Kogod News for a report of the event.

Upcoming Talk at Harvard Privacy Tools Working Group

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, co-directors of the Robust Analytics Lab, will give a (virtual) presentation to the Harvard Privacy Tools project working group, Berkman Klein Center for Internet &...

Working Paper - From Contextualizing to Context-Theorizing in Privacy Research

We posted on SSRN a working paper co-authored by Heng Xu and Nan Zhang, “From Contextualizing to Context-Theorizing: Assessing Context Effects in Privacy Research”.

KCGC Annual Report

For the Kogod Cybersecurity Governance Center (KCGC), 2019 was the year fueled with new beginnings. Our new research projects were sponsored and recognized by federal government agencies and world leading organizations. Our new distinguished lecture series convened thought leaders from...

Postdoc Opening

The Robust Analytics Lab in the Kogod School of Business at the American University in Washington, D.C. is looking for an exceptional candidate to fill a postdoctoral fellow position. The initial term of this position is one year with the...

KCGC Annual Report

In 2018, the Kogod Cybersecurity Governance Center (KCGC) welcomed new leadership, enjoyed significant intellectual growth, and developed strategic plan to focus on two aspects of cybersecurity research: human factors and data analytics. KCGC’s research on human factors aims to understand...

Presentation on “Privacy Disparity” @ Data & Society

Heng Xu and Nan Zhang visited Data & Society Research Institute in New York City and discussed how various privacy preserving techniques may disproportionately suppress information for minorities or mask...

Panel on Cybersecurity Challenges and Opportunities

Heng Xu, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, will join a panel of expert discussing “Into the Cyber domain. A view from Academia and industry” at an Embassy of Italy’s...

How your friends affect your privacy on Twitter

Among the existing solutions for protecting privacy on social media, a popular doctrine is privacy self-management, which asks users to directly control the sharing of their personal information through privacy...

Privacy disparity? Addressing privacy concerns in health disparity research

Background: Most research on identifying and understanding health disparities focused on measurement strategies and analytics design over administrative and survey data. What has received less attention, however, is the complex...

Polishing Up Data Privacy Protections

Nan Zhang, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab (RAL), was recently featured in Kogod News discussing the implications of data protection regulations like the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation...

Heng Xu won the Operational Research Society’s Stafford Beer Medal for 2018

Heng Xu was recently awarded The Operational Research Society’s Stafford Beer Medal for 2018 for her paper:

Key to Security and Privacy

Heng Xu, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab (RAL), was recently featured in Kogod News discussing why cyber risk awareness is so essential, yet often lacking, for preventing data breaches....

Talk at UMD: Privacy Contextualization: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Heng Xu, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, will give a talk at the iSchool, University of Maryland, College Park, titled “Privacy Contextualization: the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly”....

NSF Project: Privacy Regrets in Smartphone Usage

We gratefully acknowledge the National Science Foundation for their support on our project 1801539, “SaTC: CORE: Medium: Situation-Aware Identification and Rectification of Regrettable Privacy Decisions”.

Sep 26: Cybersecurity & Privacy Forum: Bridging Research & Practice

Update: See the event re-cap article in Kogod News.

Sep 27-28: Symposium on Privacy-Aware Computing

Nan Zhang, co-director of the Robust Analytics Lab, is co-chairing the technical program for this year’s IEEE Symposium on Privacy-Aware Computing (IEEE PAC) along with Joe Valacich, Eller College of...

New Director of KCGC

On July 1, 2018, Professor Heng Xu joined the Kogod Cybersecurity Governance Center as the new Center Director. Before joining Kogod in 2018, she had a mix of academic and government background, serving as a faculty member at Penn State...