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Abstract

Introduction This study explores whether internet users' concerns for personal information privacy, principally manifested as online privacy, are related to their attitudes to government surveillance and national ID cards (often perceived as a surveillance tool). This is a relationship which needs to be explored in-depth because of three concurrent trends -- first, the push towards e-government, where citizen-government transactions are increasingly conducted online; second, the growing use of smart cards, RFID tags and other portable information collection and transmission devices by governments and businesses; and third, calls for greater government surveillance, both online and offline, to counter terrorism in the post 9/11 environment. While prior research has dealt with individual concerns about online privacy and individual concerns about government surveillance, studies exploring the relationship between the two are limited. This study seeks to fill that gap by surveying Internet users across five cities which vary in their experience of government surveillance and the use of national ID cards -- Bangalore, New York, Seoul, Singapore and Sydney. Personal information privacy is the individual's ability to personally control information about him/herself. Such information could include anything from one's birth registration details, to the identities and coordinates of one's next-of-kin, income and expenditure patterns and even health records. In countries where day-to-day transactions with commercial and government entities are increasingly being conducted online, involving the electronic collection of personal information, online privacy is the principal manifestation of personal information privacy. As e-commerce and e-government services become more pervasive, Internet users' concerns about online privacy are likely to grow. Individual online privacy concerns have been classified into improper acquisition, improper use and privacy invasion. ¹² Concerns about improper acquisition relate to unauthorized access to personal information, improper collection of one's private information and improper monitoring of consumers' online activities. Concerns about improper use cover unauthorised analysis of consumers' online shopping behavior and the subsequent business-to-business transfer of such analyses. Concerns about privacy invasion refer to the transmission of information to Internet users without their prior consent, such as spam, as well as the improper storage of personal information. To maintain their online privacy, Internet users can engage in self-protective behaviour such as opting out, using privacy enhancing technologies, reading privacy policies, or checking trust marks. Studies have been conducted to test concern about online privacy as a function of demographic variables. Sheehan ¹⁰ found that gender was a significant factor in that female consumers were generally more concerned about their personal privacy than male consumers. In general, older consumers ² were also more concerned about online privacy. The relationship between consumers' experience with the Internet and online privacy concerns has also been explored. Bellman et al. ² reported that consumers' online privacy concerns diminished with Internet experience. As more consumers use the Internet and the average level of experience rises, online privacy concerns should gradually diminish. In general, studies have demonstrated that demographic variables and Internet-related experiences significantly affect Internet users' concern about online privacy.
contributed articles
116 COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM | december 2009 | vol. 52 | no. 12
DOI: 10.1145/1610252.1610283
BY SUN SUN LIM, HICHANG CHO, AND MILAGROS RIVERA SANCHEZ
This sTudy explores wheTher inTerneT users’ concerns
for personal information privacy, principally
manifested as online privacy, are related to their
attitudes to government surveillance and national ID
cards (often perceived as a surveillance tool). This is
a relationship which needs to be explored in-depth
because of three concurrent trends – first, the push
towards e-government, where citizen-government
transactions are increasingly conducted online;
second, the growing use of smart cards, RFID tags
and other portable information collection and
transmission devices by governments and businesses;
and third, calls for greater government surveillance,
both online and offline, to counter terrorism in the
post 9/11 environment.
While prior research has dealt with
individual concerns about online priva-
cy and individual concerns about gov-
ernment surveillance, studies explor-
ing the relationship between the two
are limited. This study seeks to fill that
gap by surveying Internet users across
five cities which vary in their experience
of government surveillance and the use
of national ID cards – Bangalore, New
York, Seoul, Singapore and Sydney.
Personal information privacy is the
individual’s ability to personally control
information about him/herself. Such
information could include anything
from one’s birth registration details, to
the identities and coordinates of one’s
next-of-kin, income and expenditure
patterns and even health records. In
countries where day-to-day transac-
tions with commercial and government
entities are increasingly being conduct-
ed online, involving the electronic col-
lection of personal information, online
privacy is the principal manifestation
of personal information privacy.
As e-commerce and e-government
services become more pervasive, Inter-
net users’ concerns about online priva-
cy are likely to grow. Individual online
privacy concerns have been classified
into improper acquisition, improper
use and privacy invasion.12 Concerns
about improper acquisition relate to
unauthorized access to personal infor-
mation, improper collection of one’s
private information and improper
monitoring of consumers’ online activ-
ities. Concerns about improper use cov-
er unauthorised analysis of consumers’
online shopping behavior and the sub-
sequent business-to-business transfer
of such analyses. Concerns about pri-
vacy invasion refer to the transmission
of information to Internet users with-
out their prior consent, such as spam,
as well as the improper storage of per-
sonal information. To maintain their
online privacy, Internet users can en-
gage in self-protective behaviour such
as opting out, using privacy enhancing
technologies, reading privacy policies,
or checking trust marks.
Studies have been conducted to test
Online
Privacy,
Government
Surveillance
and National
ID Cards
december 2009 | vol. 52 | no. 12 | COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM 117
contributed articles
Adding depth and complexity to this
issue is the fact that while Internet users
desire online privacy, they also see the
benefits of government surveillance in
enhancing national security, especially
in the post 9/11 environment.5 How-
ever, the value of national security vis-
à-vis online privacy varies from country
to country and from person to person.
Emphasis on individual rights is argu-
ably stronger in the West. In the US for
example, privacy is seen as a basic hu-
man right and entrenched in the Bill of
Rights. In contrast, Asian legal systems
have tended to overlook the individual’s
interest in favour of the collective: “The
importance of national goals to life in
say, Singapore or Japan, has no equiva-
lents in other parts of the world, and
can permit much higher levels of intru-
sive surveillance than would be coun-
tenanced in surveillance-conscious
regions such as Scandinavia.”8 On an
individual level, those who see the ad-
vantages of government surveillance in
stamping out crime and terrorism may
have a higher threshold for privacy in-
trusions. They may therefore accord a
higher priority to national security than
to individual privacy. Hence, we ask: Do
attitudes to government surveillance in-
fluence online privacy concerns?
Online Privacy and
National ID cards
National ID cards are often perceived
(and criticised) as instruments of sur-
veillance. Indeed, the introduction of
national ID cards has been resisted in
countries such as the U.S. and Austra-
lia. Australia’s attempt to launch the
“Australia card” national identification
scheme between 1986 and 1987 met
with such severe public opposition that
it was not granted parliamentary ap-
proval. Indeed, studies have found that
the way in which an identity card is in-
troduced into a community impacts on
the level of public acceptance. The lev-
el of compulsion and the existence of a
centralised database can raise privacy
concerns7 while transparency and pub-
lic consultation can alleviate them.1
While some countries are contem-
plating the adoption of identity cards,
many European and Asian countries
already issue and use them. Citizens/
residents of these countries are rou-
tinely asked to provide national ID card
numbers when using governmental
concern about online privacy as a func-
tion of demographic variables. Shee-
han10 found that gender was a signifi-
cant factor in that female consumers
were generally more concerned about
their personal privacy than male con-
sumers. In general, older consumers2
were also more concerned about online
privacy. The relationship between con-
sumers’ experience with the Internet
and online privacy concerns has also
been explored. Bellman et al.2 reported
that consumers’ online privacy con-
cerns diminished with Internet experi-
ence. As more consumers use the Inter-
net and the average level of experience
rises, online privacy concerns should
gradually diminish. In general, studies
have demonstrated that demographic
variables and Internet-related experi-
ences significantly affect Internet us-
ers’ concern about online privacy.
Online Privacy, Dataveillance
and Government Surveillance
Dataveillance has been defined as the
“systematic use of personal data sys-
tems in the investigation or monitor-
ing of the actions or communications
of one or more persons.”4 While the
relationship between concerns about
online privacy and attitudes to govern-
ment surveillance may not be immedi-
ately obvious, the concept of dataveil-
lance may provide some links.
Surveillance is essentially institu-
tionalised intrusion into privacy and
governments worldwide engage in
surveillance of their citizens to varying
degrees. Government surveillance can
incorporate a range of activities – from
extreme physical intrusions to day-to-
day gathering of personal information,
for example, dataveillance. Dataveil-
lance is the most common and perva-
sive form of government surveillance as
governments worldwide collect infor-
mation for social services, taxes, voter
registration, birth, death, marriage re-
cords, utilities, education etc. With the
growth of Internet based e-commerce
and the proliferation of e-government
services, dataveillance will be increas-
ingly conducted online. Consequently,
Internet users may become more con-
scious about how their online privacy
will be affected. In this regard, Internet
users’ attitudes to government surveil-
lance may affect their level of concern
with online privacy as a whole.
and business services, thus enjoying
the convenience of completing a range
of transactions by utilising only that
one number. Aside from convenience,
it has also been noted that national ID
cards can aid in the prevention of ter-
rorism and identity theft, and serve as
documentary proof of one’s identity.6
However, critics argue that such
benefits are greatly outweighed by se-
curity risks such as overzealous surveil-
lance.9 One study concluded that while
the post 9/11 atmosphere has made
Americans more amenable to the idea
of a national ID card, they are still con-
cerned about the possible loss of pri-
vacy through authorized or unauthor-
ized use of personal information.6 Yet
another study predicted that with the
increased use of smartcards, RFID tags
and other such information collection
devices, there will be more demands
for government regulation of such
technology so that individual privacy
is protected.11 Therefore, we ask: Does
experience with using national ID cards
influence online privacy concerns?
However, attitudes to national ID
cards are not contingent upon experi-
ence with using them. Individuals in
countries which do not issue identity
cards may still hold the opinion that
such cards are beneficial to society. Sim-
ilarly, individuals in countries which do
issue identity cards may have negative
opinions towards their use. Therefore,
we recognise that a distinction should
be made between experience with using
national ID cards and attitudes towards
national ID cards. Hence, we addition-
ally ask: Do attitudes to national ID cards
influence online privacy concerns?
Research Method
Sample and data collection. An online
survey was conducted amongst Internet
users in Bangalore, New York, Seoul,
Singapore and Sydney. Seoul and Sin-
gapore were selected because globally,
they rank high in Internet penetration
and broadband connectivity, and they
issue national ID cards to their citizens
and residents. While national ID cards
are not issued in India, voter registra-
tion cards which are issued nationwide
are often used and widely regarded as
identity cards. These three Asian cities
were then counter-balanced by Sydney
and New York, both of which do not is-
sue national ID cards.
contributed articles
118 COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM | december 2009 | vol. 52 | no. 12
The survey, conducted in 2003, took
the form of an online, self-administered
questionnaire comprising 47 questions,
most of which contained 7-point Likert-
scale items. The same English language
survey was used for Bangalore, New
York, Singapore and Sydney, and trans-
lated into Korean for administration in
Seoul. To ensure consistency of survey
implementation, a research company
with branches in all five cities was hired
to conduct the surveys. Survey respon-
dents were randomly selected from the
company’s panel database for each city.
Email invitations were sent out continu-
ously until the required sample size (300
Internet users per city) was attained. The
total number of respondents for each
city was 300. However, after eliminat-
ing unreliable answers, the final sample
size per city was: Bangalore: 244, Syd-
ney: 280, Singapore: 277, Seoul: 196 and
New York: 264.
Measure. Internet users’ online privacy
concern was measured by a 5-item scale
covering various dimensions such as
concerns about online privacy in gen-
eral, concerns about data collection by
online entities, and control over online
privacy ( = .759). Internet users’ atti-
tudes toward government surveillance
and national ID cards were measured
by 6-item Likert scales (see Table 1). To
control for the effects of other relevant
variables, we also measured national cul-
ture (individualism), demographics (age,
gender, education, and income), and
Internet-related experiences (the lengths
and frequencies of Internet use and on-
line shopping, SPAM mail received, and
online shopping spending).
Data Analysis
National variances in online privacy
concerns, attitudes to government sur-
veillance and national identity cards.
Figure 1 shows the differences in on-
line privacy concerns, attitudes toward
government surveillance and attitudes
toward national ID cards across the five
cities.
ANOVA tests showed that the dif-
ferences in online privacy concerns
[F(4,1256)=81.331, p <.001], atti-
tudes to government surveillance
[F(4,1256)=33.642, p <.001], and attitudes
to national ID cards [F(4,1256)=60.706,
p<.001] across the five cities were all sig-
nificant (see Table 2). Internet users in
Seoul had the most negative attitude to-
wards government surveillance, while
those in Bangalore were the most posi-
tive. Interestingly, Internet users in New
York and Sydney, the two cities which
do not use or issue national ID cards,
had the most negative attitudes towards
these cards. Another point of note is that
across all five cities, while Internet users
held somewhat high levels of concern for
online privacy (M=5.41), attitudes to gov-
ernment surveillance (M=3.89) and the
use of national ID cards (M=3.75) were
more neutral. This trend is suggestive of
the ambivalence which individuals feel
about these two practices that on the
one hand, government surveillance and
the use of national ID cards may compro-
mise one’s personal information privacy;
on the other hand, they could help to en-
hance national security.
How attitudes to government surveil-
lance and National ID cards affect on-
line privacy concerns. Table 2 summa-
rizes the results of regression analysis.
To test the relationships between the
variables, multiple regression analy-
sis was conducted. Given that cultural
attitudes may influence consumer
Table 1. Scales for measuring attitudes
to government surveillance and national
identity cards
The Government’s ability to monitor the
activities of its citizens...
• Keepsmycountrysafe
• Infringesmypersonalliberty
• Isimportantformaintainingnational
securityandsocialstability
• Isintrusive
• Makesiteasiertoarrestcriminals,
terroristsandillegalimmigrants
• Isunnecessary
National identity cards….
• Arenecessaryformaintainingnational
security
• EnhancetheGovernment’spowerof
surveillanceoveritscitizens
• Helptoguardagainstterrorismand
illegalimmigration
• EnabletheGovernmenttomonitorthe
activitiesofitscitizens
• Helptoenhancepersonalsecurity
• Infringeonpersonalliberty
Figure 1. Five-city comparison of levels of online privacy concern, attitudes toward
government surveillance and attitudes to national ID cards
* Based on 7 point Likert scales (1=less concerned/positive attitudes, 7=highly concerned/negative attitudes)
Table 2. Comparison of attitudes toward government surveillance and national ID use
across five cities showing means and standard deviations
Sydney Singapore Seoul Bangalore New York Total F
OnlinePrivacy
Concern
5.60
(.97)
5.91
(.86)
5.20
(.86)
4.57
(.93)
5.62
(.91)
5.41
(1.01)
81.331**
Government
Surveillance
4.15
(1.42)
3.92
(1.31)
4.69
(0.89)
3.46
(0.87)
4.39
(1.36)
3.89
(1.06)
33.642**
NationalID
carduse
3.99
(1.24)
3.15
(0.87)
4.01
(0.60)
3.39
(0.87)
4.29
(1.14)
3.75
(1.07)
60.706**
( ): Standard Deviation
** p <.01
december 2009 | vol. 52 | no. 12 | COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM 119
contributed articles
influence an individual’s overall priva-
cy concerns are likely to influence his/
her online privacy concerns a well. As
our findings show, factors which are
ostensibly extraneous to the Internet,
such as, attitudes to government sur-
veillance and experience with national
ID cards, can also influence an indi-
vidual’s online privacy concerns. Man-
agers of Internet sites should therefore
be aware of such factors when formu-
lating their privacy policies.
As fears of terrorism mount in the
post 9/11 environment, the nature and
extent of government surveillance and
dataveillance is likely to change. This
will in turn affect individuals’ con-
cerns about personal information pri-
vacy and specifically, online privacy.
Concerns about dataveillance are also
likely to increase with the growth of e-
government services and smart card
technology. Hence, in trying to gauge
their potential target audience, man-
agers of Internet sites have to consider
the entire environment shaping in-
dividuals’ privacy and online privacy
concerns, and not just focus only on
Internet-based factors. In addition,
they should also be cognisant of trends
in e-government because individuals’
concerns about dataveillance by public
and private organisations may mutu-
ally influence each other and together,
influence online privacy concerns.
References
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adoption of smartcards,1 we included
national culture in the model as a con-
trol variable. Other control variables
included were demographics and In-
ternet-related experiences. The associa-
tion between government surveillance
and privacy concern was significant (b=
-.179, p < .001), indicating that Internet
users with positive attitudes to govern-
ment surveillance are less concerned
about online privacy. Arguably, Internet
users who regard government surveil-
lance positively are likely to have higher
thresholds for privacy intrusions and
thus, it stands to reason that they have
lower levels of online privacy concern.
One would therefore expect that Inter-
net users with positive attitudes to na-
tional identity cards would also have
lower levels of online privacy concern.
Instead, our findings show that atti-
tudes to national ID cards had a positive
association with online privacy concern
((b= .133, p < .001), that is, Internet us-
ers with more positive attitudes to na-
tional identity cards have higher levels
of online privacy concern.
This apparent inconsistency may
be due to the fact that while govern-
ment surveillance can be an abstract
concept, national identity cards are an
observable instrumentation of govern-
ment surveillance practices. Envision-
ing the use of national identity cards
in daily transactions accentuates the
practical implications of government
surveillance, dataveillance and poten-
tial privacy intrusions. Hence, while
people can hold positive attitudes to
national identity cards, they can be
concurrently more concerned about
online privacy because they anticipate
the potential adverse effects of these
cards on their online privacy.
How experience with national ID cards
affects online privacy concerns. We ran
a separate ANCOVA analysis to test the
effect of national ID cards experience
on online privacy concern. Interesting-
ly, Internet users from countries which
issue national ID cards exhibited lower
levels of privacy concerns (M=5.26)
than those from countries which do not
(M=5.61). The difference is statistically
significant (F=9.25, p<.01), after con-
trolling for the effects of the same con-
trol variables as noted above. Viewed
in tandem with the previous findings
about attitudes to national identity
cards, it seems that while positive at-
titudes to national identity cards raises
online privacy concerns, actual experi-
ence with using national identity cards
may lead to a decline in online privacy
concerns. Actual experience with using
national ID cards appears therefore to
desensitise Internet users to privacy in-
trusions, due possibly to three reasons.
First, their online privacy concerns are
neutralised by the convenience which
using such cards can bring. Second,
from their experience of using identity
cards, they realise that the potential
for privacy intrusions is not that sig-
nificant; or third, they become accus-
tomed/resigned to the online privacy
intrusions which accompany the use of
national identity cards.
Limitations and Managerial
Implications
Please note that our findings are based
on correlational analyses, making it
difficult to establish causality. For in-
stance, it could be argued that online
privacy concerns can influence indi-
viduals’ attitudes toward government
surveillance and national ID card use,
suggesting that the causal direction
can go the other way.
Internet users’ concerns about on-
line privacy can have negative conse-
quences for the broad-scale adoption
of the Internet and e-commerce. Sur-
veys show that Internet users who are
most concerned about threats to their
online privacy are least likely to engage
in online shopping, and many Internet
users who have never made an online
purchase cite privacy concerns as a key
reason for their inaction. Indeed, the
perceived risks of shopping online,
such as vulnerability to credit card
fraud, have been found to outweigh its
perceived convenience.3 Furthermore,
online privacy concerns can negatively
influence Internet users’ online behav-
ior, such as, Internet users with stron-
ger online privacy concerns are more
likely to provide incomplete informa-
tion to Web sites or to request removal
from mailing lists, thereby adversely
impacting online consumer relation-
ship management activities.
It is important to note though that
online privacy is but one facet of an
individual’s overall privacy concerns,
which persist whether the individual is
online or offline. Hence, factors which
contributed articles
120 COMMUNICATIONS OF THE ACM | december 2009 | vol. 52 | no. 12
security, and individual privacy: New tools, new
threats, and new public perceptions. Journal of
the American Society for Information Science and
Technology, 56, (2005), 221-234.
12. Wang, H. Q., Lee, M. K. O. & Wang, C.
Consumer privacy concerns about Internet marketing.
Commun. ACM 41, 3, (Mar.1998), 63-70.
This study was supported by a grant from National
University of Singapore (R-124-000-006-112). The
authors thank the editor and the anonymous reviewers
for their helpful comments.
SunSunLim (sunlim@nus.edu.sg) is an assistant
professor at the Communications and New Media
Programme, National University of Singapore.
HichangCho (cnmch@nus.edu.sg) is an assistant
professor at the Communications and New Media
Programme, National University of Singapore.
MilagrosRivera Sanchez(mrivera@nus.edu.sg) is an
associate professor and head of the Communications and
New Media Programme, National University of Singapore.
© 2009 ACM 0001-0782/09/1200 $10.00
... Theoretical evaluations and opinions on privacy and surveillance have been more prominent than empirical research on the topic. Existing empirical research has mainly focused on cross-cultural differences in attitudes towards government surveillance in general contexts [24]. investigated differences in online privacy concerns and surveillance attitudes of Internet users across five cities: Bangalore, New York, Seoul, Singapore, and Sydney. ...
... Empiricalbeta testing of symptom tracking application Privacy concerns and personal data General Context [24] The paper investigates big five cities. Results show that People in Seoul expressed the most negative attitudes towards surveillance, while people in Bangalore the most positive ones. ...
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... The governments will strive to make ID schemes legal and argue that the ID schemes can help to build a modern database of citizens, improve cybersecurity, and assist financial institutions in their know-your-customers (KYC) functions. However, there are strong concerns that national ID schemes or programs, which are a result of digital-only financial inclusion, can enable unnecessary government surveillance of private citizens' financial activity, and could shift the government's focus from financial inclusion to State surveillance (Lim, Cho, Sanchez, 2009;Lips, Taylor and Organ, 2009;Whitley, 2013). ...
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The literature has not extensively examined the dangers of digital-only financial inclusion. The purpose of this chapter is to highlight the dangers of digital-only financial inclusion (DOFI). Using the discourse analysis method, the study showed that digital-only financial inclusion may be difficult to achieve when there is uneven availability and uneven access to digital devices. It was also argued that digital-only financial inclusion could lead to high cost of internet broadband, and it places much emphasis on accelerating digital access rather than protecting users who use digital finance platforms. Furthermore, it pays little attention to risk mitigation, and produces digital ID schemes that enable government surveillance. It also prioritizes digital access rather than financial health; and makes it easier to perpetrate fraud using digital means. Finally, it can enable the endless pursuit of power, and it prioritizes a digital version of financial inclusion at any cost.
... Across the globe, many countries have either implemented some form of national identification card system or planning to implement one. The motives for this action is often similar among these countries; improve identification and authentication, reduce crime, fight terrorism, prevent identity theft, to make it easier for governments to provides e-services to its citizen, etc. [11] [12]. With the advancement in technology, Identification Cards (IDs) have grown from the simple cards with basic information of the card bearer to a more complex card where not only the basic information of the card bearer is stored on the card but additional information such as biometric data. ...
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