TY - GEN
T1 - The handling of personal information in mobile games
AU - Brückner, Stefan
AU - Sato, Yukiko
AU - Kurabayashi, Shuichi
AU - Waragai, Ikumi
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© Springer International Publishing AG, part of Springer Nature 2018.
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - The management of personal consumer information by corporate entities is a politically and socially sensitive subject. This paper examines how personal information is handled by mobile game developers and displayed inside mobile games. 38 mobile games from 29 developers were examined, chosen based on their popularity as expressed by the rankings in the Google Play store. An investigation was made into the type of information that is required during the registration process, what information is optional, and what information is finally displayed in the game and to whom. In a second step, the privacy policies of the 29 mobile game developers were compared, examining them for differences in content. Lastly, the reaction of game developers to written requests for information disclosure and deletion was investigated. Results suggest that how personal information is displayed in-game is largely dependent on the game genre. Privacy policies, while following the same template, differ in how detailed they are held. Lastly, replies to inquiries about information and requests for deletion varied greatly and sometimes were at odds with a company’s privacy policy. This investigation indicates the necessity of accumulating and sharing know-how and best practices for the design of privacy policies and the proper handling of personal information.
AB - The management of personal consumer information by corporate entities is a politically and socially sensitive subject. This paper examines how personal information is handled by mobile game developers and displayed inside mobile games. 38 mobile games from 29 developers were examined, chosen based on their popularity as expressed by the rankings in the Google Play store. An investigation was made into the type of information that is required during the registration process, what information is optional, and what information is finally displayed in the game and to whom. In a second step, the privacy policies of the 29 mobile game developers were compared, examining them for differences in content. Lastly, the reaction of game developers to written requests for information disclosure and deletion was investigated. Results suggest that how personal information is displayed in-game is largely dependent on the game genre. Privacy policies, while following the same template, differ in how detailed they are held. Lastly, replies to inquiries about information and requests for deletion varied greatly and sometimes were at odds with a company’s privacy policy. This investigation indicates the necessity of accumulating and sharing know-how and best practices for the design of privacy policies and the proper handling of personal information.
KW - Information privacy
KW - Mobile games
KW - Personal information
KW - Privacy policy
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85043528743&partnerID=8YFLogxK
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U2 - 10.1007/978-3-319-76270-8_29
DO - 10.1007/978-3-319-76270-8_29
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:85043528743
SN - 9783319762692
T3 - Lecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
SP - 415
EP - 429
BT - Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology - 14th International Conference, ACE 2017, Proceedings
A2 - Inami, Masahiko
A2 - Romao, Teresa
A2 - Cheok, Adrian David
A2 - Cheok, Adrian David
PB - Springer Verlag
T2 - 14th International Conference on Advances in Computer Entertainment Technology, ACE 2017
Y2 - 14 December 2017 through 16 December 2017
ER -