IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2018 - 60

which a given user's privacy
may be in jeopardy, and in this
case the system alerts the user
Teleport to Private Copy -
[ ] Clones
a nd suggests u sa ge of the
Choose Dest:
[ ] Invisible
tools. How can a system detect
[X] Teleport
[ ] Lockout
when a user's privacy is in dan[X] Private Copy
ger? Certain user-independent
Done
event patterns may come into
play, for example the system
might recognize that the user is
(a)
(b)
within view of a crowd of avatars or bots, even if the user
Welcome to
Welcome to
does not notice or cannot see
Private
Returnuing
to
Main
Virtual
World
-
Center View Casino
Center View Casino
Copy
these observers.
Discard Private Copy, or
Merge Changes?
Exit
The context of user interacDiscard
Merge
tion is another source of information that can be used to
detect when privacy is in jeopardy. For example, the system
may detect that the user is
(c)
(d)
about to begin a privacy-sensitive interaction with the virtual
Figure 4. (a)-(d) User selects multiple privacy plans for use in combination.
world. The user might be entering a virtual bank, for example,
or may be starting to shop for
Mataverse Server
Computing Device
sensitive items like lingerie at
which point the system could
M3
recognize this pattern and sugPM
Metaverse 1
(M1)
User
gest the usage of a privacy plan.
This recommendation may be
Network
Privacy
Computing Device
based on the location or type of
Manager
interaction the user is engaged
M2
in, as well as the relative proxMetaverse 1
PM
(M2)
imity of other avatars or bots.
User
The recommendation could
also take into account how the
Privacy
Manager
user has invoked the privacy
M2
PM
tools in the past. For example, if
User
the user has regularly used the
Computing Device
Lockout Plan in the past, the
system recommends Lockout
Figure 5. IT deployment in context.
when it is viable; but if such a
plan is determined to be not
and then chooses to exit back to the main virtual world.
viable due to local observers already in the space, then
As illustrated in Figure 4(d), the system offers to discard
the system recommends using a Private Copy Plan.
or preserve changes that the user made to the private
Deployment
copy of the casino.
This article has focused on the logical development of priAn additional benefit of having a framework of privavacy plans. To provide real world context, this section procy plans is that the system may assist the user in the use
vides a high level view of a deployment scheme compatible
of the available privacy plans. While it is nice to have a
with the needs of privacy plans in social (VR) metaverses.
rich menu of tools for enhancing privacy, these tools
Figure 5 illustrates that playable metaverses will be served
won't have much value if the user doesn't realize when
from servers over the Internet. Users (embodied as avatars
or how the tools should be used. For this reason, the sysin the metaverse) connect from their devices and make use
tem monitors the virtual world to detect situations in

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JUNE 2018

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - June 2018