Designing Security Infrastructures for Communities with Sensitive Data (DESIC)
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DESIC

Designing Security Infrastructures for Communities with Sensitive Data (DESIC)

information safekeepingdataclassificationcommunication

Partners

Angelou Centre
Union of Women Associations of Heraklion

Project Lead

Vasilis Vlachokyriakos, Newcastle University

Co-investigators

Rachel Clarke, Newcastle University

Project Type

Funded Project

For this project the research team explored notions of ‘positive digital security’ with two organizations focused on promoting empowerment and active citizenship for migrant women experiencing gender-based violence in the UK (Angelou Centre) and Greece (UWAH). They developed a low-fidelity web-based prototype to include both an administrator and client-based system for data management. The design was informed by three themes: information safekeeping and sharing, access to data and classification and communication.

The admin app consists of a form that maps the data each organization needs to have on each woman’s case. The client app allows each woman access to the data concerning her case. She can give access to to staff members and other organizations and also revoke access. The client app serves as communication between the organization and the women with an end-to-end encrypted chat functionality. The team believes it is important to further explore the interplay between offline and online harms in order to design technologies that can protect and support women to prevent potential harms from emerging.

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