I recently started to work on Wifi based geolocation using the Mozilla Location Service. It works by sending the Wifi access points to the web server. Of course we cannot do that without the users consent. We need to give the user a choice and it should be an educated choice not just a click through.

Thus I would like the VDG to come up with some idea of how we could design a "privacy center" which allows to easily see where we send data to the web (e.g. facebook integration, etc.) and what this actually means. And of course a one place to turn things on and off.

That would be great. A security center would also be a great addition. I believe open suse has something like a checklist in yast, of all the things that might need securing in your system.

Agreed that this would be a "killer" feature.

But how could it be implemented? Get the design group on the case to see what is needed and perhaps draft something?

Yeah! Great idea!

So, what should this privacy center be able to do?

• Detect privacy issues
• Give access to privacy settings (like mentioned by mgraesslin)
• Notify user if something is wrong (How? When?)
• Give the user a solution to problems. This solution should be easy to use (if possible)

What should it detect? I think it should not only detect data sent to the Web, but also common security->privacy risks

• (High) Insecure WLAN -> ?
• (High) System not updated [security updates] -> offer update
• (Severe) SSL certificate abnormalities (-> Superfish) -> ?
• (High?) Insecure encryption (if possible) (eg RC4) (?) -> ?
• (?)Advise to encrypt data if using Cloud services -> Setup one-click auto encryption somehow (Encrypted containers? Encrypted files?)* [if possible]
• (?)Password manager: Advise to change passwords every x*t [Integrate common password managers?]
• (? [laptop/tablet vs computer]) User data not encrypted -> Offer One-Click encryption of (at least) /home/[user], USB sticks**
• more?

* Should be as easy and comfortable as possible
** how to deal with other platforms & computers ?

This center should also provide:

• Maybe a list of all applications, sending/downloading from network
• List of usb network cards, usb keyboards (?) [Even if it's too late detect(?) BadUSB]
• Maybe a "Security report" feature, which for example tracks the password "timeouts", marks times when and why private data may have exposed, ...

--

Maybe the center should be always available as little notification icon in the tray bar. The icon would change its color according to the current "risk". If anything very severe happens, a notification opens, so the user can take action immediately.
The design of the application itself should not be "overloaded" like "security"/anti virus programs and should provide a checklist in the main window and maybe some security tricks.

Let's keep out the security risks for the moment as that is way more difficult. E.g. detecting whether software updates are needed is something which requires distribution integrations. Similar for things like looking at cert stores - we are never able to give a true account, because well we don't know what a mess the user installed

Also, this might include recent documents disabling (per activity)

ivan wrote:Also, this might include recent documents disabling (per activity)

+1

What is the privacy concern about recent documents? Is there more to it then "I don't want to see my friend, who happens to use my account, what I just read"?

For me this is a totally different kind of privacy compaired to "Don't send my current position to some external server". And I think, mixing these two is not a good idea. Most users wont understand the difference. Just like most users probably think, that using the private modus in your browsers will prevent third parties from collecting your data. But its not, instead it just clears the history, cookies and some stuff on exit.

If you put both types in a privacy center at least they should be very clearly seperated from each other.

In the far future, DWD options could be presented here (assuming specific features see the light of day); such as toggling whether or not applications may broadcast widgets to phone+world. ++ On recent documents being optional.

My one concern would be this becoming a 'grab bag' or dumping ground of sorts; would it be worth considering existing KCMs for these features? For example, recent documents is (could be) handled by search, so perhaps Vishesh might want that integrated into the search KCM. WiFi-based location might better be put as a tool network settings or locale (I don't have Plasma5 on this machine, so I can't recall the exact control panel layout); while having a dedicated 'Privacy' KCM sounds super-sexy, I'd hate to see it eat utilities better handled by more relatable sections.

Plus, things like Canonicals' "Diagnostics" KCM already tags itself as 'privacy' in the search tool...

Thomas Pfeiffer (aka @colomar) is an expert for usability aspects of security. I hope he will made it to contribute this weekend.

Here's an idea I had for a privacy center. May not be exactly what you guys are looking for but I thought I'd push it out there anyway.

So essentially this would work in a similar way to G+'s circles, in that all the apps / services with similar requirements (the coloured tabs) would be grouped together. I would envisage some kind of drag and drop to be able to move them around, and for the power users there would be the ability to create new circles with custom rules.

Just an idea anyway. I think the main problem is knowing what default circles to put the things into anyway.

I think the most imminent settings that need to be presented are:
* Location provider through WLAN (sends found SSIDs to a service)
* Media controls on the lock screen
* Notifications on the lock screen

The first one has already been implemented but disabled by default due to the lack of a config dialog. The media controls I'd like to implement but we need to make that configurable. On the other hand, the latter two need to be implemented by the lock screen theme. So perhaps we need a settings dialog provided by the lock screen theme, like we used to have in LightDM?

wow. this was 2015.

in times like these, the necessity remains unbroken and it would still be a killer feature in 2019. what/who held you back?

anyway, i saw this sticker :

https://twitter.com/thepine64/status/11 ... 3803387905

= gives me hope.