Content

In this seminar, we will discuss political aspects of security and privacy technology and research. We will discuss both historical and ongoing areas of tension. Some topics are censorship, surveillance, information leakage and other security and privacy challenges that harm individuals, at-risk users and nations.

 

Time & Location

The seminar kick-off will be on the 25 April 2025.
The following in-person meetings will be on Fridays at 1pm c.t. as indicated in the table below.

Location: Building E9 1, CISPA C0, Stuhlsatzenhaus 5, 66123 Saarbrücken.

 

Course modalities

This course will discuss a corpus of research papers centered around four main topics: (1) Activism and censorship, (2) Harms to marginalized populations, (3) External security of nation state actors, and (4) Surveillance capitalism.

As a general introduction, we will start the seminar with a short presentation and discussion on Rogaway's The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work.

Afterward, each seminar participant will present one paper of their choice and lead the discussion on the topic (10 min presentation, 5 min Q&A, 30 min discussion). All other participants will need to read the papers prior to the presentation of each paper. 

Additionally, groups of 3-4 students will create presentation slides to present their overall main topic and create accompanying lecture notes and assignments (including a grading scheme). The overall goal is to kickstart the creation of a lecture unit for the Security Core lecture on the topic of Politics of Cybersecurity. 

 

Grading

50% paper presentation + discussion
40% group presentation + presentation slides + lecture notes + assignment
10% participation in discussions 

 

Seminar Schedule

Week	Date	Time	Room	Description
17	25. April 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Introduction, Organization, and Discussion about Rogaway's The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work
19	9. May 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
20	16. May 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
21	23. May 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
23	6. June 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	E1.7, Room 0.08	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
24	13. June 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
26	27. June 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
27	4. July 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Individual Paper Presentations and Discussion (2 slots)
28	11. July 2025			Unscheduled
29	18. July 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Group Work Presentations (2 slots)
30	25. July 2025	13:00 c.t. — 15:00	CISPA C0 (Stuhlsatzenhaus 5), 0.02	Group Work Presentations (2 slots)

 

Contact

If you have urgent questions about this seminar contact the team via mail at seminar-polsec@cispa.de

 

Papers

These are (tentatively) the papers we'll be reading during the seminar. All papers are available in the materials section. 

Intro Session

• Rogaway - The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work

Activism and Censorship

• Tschantz et al. - SoK: Towards Grounding Sensorship Circumvention in Empiricism
• Daffalla et al. - Defensive Technology Use by Political Activists During the Sudanese Revolution
• Abbas et al. - Cyber Laws and Media Censorship in Pakistan: An Investigation of Governmental Tactics to Curtail Freedom of Expression and Right to Privacy

Harms of Marginalized Populations

• Thomas et al. - SoK: Hate, Harassment, and the Changing Landscape of Online Abuse
• Guberek et al. - Keeping a Low Profile?: Technology, Risk and Privacy among Undocumented Immigrants
• Slupska - Safe at Home: Towards a Feminist Critique of Cybersecurity
• Song et al. - Collective Privacy Sensemaking on Social Media about Period and Fertility Tracking post Roe v. Wade

External Security of Nation State Actors

• Abelson et al. - Bugs in our Pockets: The Risks of Client-Side Scanning
• Kotliar and Carmi - Keeping Pegasus on the wing: legitimizing cyber espionage
• Broda and Strömbäck - Misinformation, Disinformation, and Fake News: Lessons from an Interdisciplinary, Systemic Literature Review
• Stevens - Assembling Cybersecurity: The Politics and Materiality of Technical Malware Reports and the Case of Stuxnet

Surveillance Capitalism

• Zuboff - Big other: Surveillance Capitalism and the Prospects of an Information Civilization
• West - Amazon: Surveillance as a Service
• Strycharz and Segijn - The Future of Dataveillance in Advertising Theory and Practice

Supplementary Reading Material

In addition to the papers, this is the supplementary reading material. For some topics, it might make sense to also read parts of the supplementary reading material to make more sense of the topic. This list ist not exhaustive. 

Meta

• Kamara - Crypto for the People (Invited Talk at CRYPTO 2020)
• Rosenbloom - Cryptograph and Collective Power
• Harry - The Adversary: The Philosophy of Cryptography
• Rogaway - The Moral Character of Cryptographic Work (Distinguished Lecture at Asiacrypt 2015)
• Deibert - Toard a Human-Centric Approach to Cybersecurity

Activism and Censorship

• Blond et al. - A Look at Targeted Attacks Through the Lense of an NGO

Harms of Marginalized Populations

• Freed et al. - "A Stalker's Paradise": How Intimate Partner Abusers Exploit Technology
• Majebi and Hamza - Child Safety in the Digital Age: Historical Lessons from Media Regulation and Their Application to Modern Cybersecurity Policies
• Schafer et al. - Participatory Design and Power in Misinformation, Disinformation, and Online Hate Research
• Sim et al. - A Scaleable Inclusive Security Intervention to Center Marginalized and Vulnerable Populations in Security & Privacy Design

External Security of Nation State Actors

• Bhardwaj and Guthoff et al. - Mental Models, Expectations and Implications of Client-Side Scanning: An Interview Study with Experts
• Chen et al. - Social Network Behavior and Public Opinion Manipulation
• Cummings and Kong - Breaking Down "Fake News": Differences Between Misinformation, Disinformation, Rumors, and Propaganda
• Fidler - Regulating the Zero-Day Vulnerability Trade: A Preliminary Analysis
• Lucas - Ethics and Cyber Warfare: The Quest for Responsible Security in the Age of Digital Warfare
• Marczak et al. - When Governments Hack Opponents: A Look at Actors and Technology
• Robinson et al. - Cyber Warfare: Issues and Challenges

Surveillance Capitalism

• TBA

Social Responsibility

• Kekulluoglu et al. - Preserving Privacy as Social Responsibility in Online Social Networks
• Khan et al. - Is Cybersecurity a Social Responsibility? 
• Pain - The Social Responsibilities of Scientists
• Scales Avery - The Social Responsibility of Scientists 
• Wu et al. - SoK: Social Cybersecurity

Other

• Cavelty and Wenger - Cyber Security Politics: Socio-Technical Transformations and Political Fragmentation
• Christen et al. - The Ethics of Cybersecurity
• Coleman - Hacker, Hoaxer, Whistleblower, Spy: The Many Faces of Anonymous
• Diffie and Landau - Privacy on The Line: The Politics of Wiretapping and Encryption 
• Dunn Cavelty - The Politics of Cybersecurity
• Dwyer et al. - What Can a Critical Cybersecurity Do? 
• Egelman et al. - Markets for zero-day exploits: Ethics and Implications
• Hall et al. - The Pitfalls of "Security by Obscurity" And What They Mean for Transparent AI
• Harris - @War: The Rise of The Military-Internet Complex
• Jarvis - Crypto Wars: The Firght for Privacy in the Digital Age
• Marczak et al. - HIDE AND SEEK Tracking NSO Group's Pegasus Spyware to Operations in 45 Countries
• Maurushat - From Cybercrime to Cyberwar: Security through Obscurity or Security through Absurdity? 
• Miller and Bossomaier - Cybersecurity, Ethics, and Collective Responsibility
• Parks and Duggan - Principles of Cyberwarfare
• Parsons et al. - The Predator in Your Pocket: A Multidisciplinary Assessment of the Stalkerware Application Industry
• UNICEF Office of Global Insight and Policy - Howard et al. - Digital Misinformation/Disinformation and Children
• Wheeler - In Cyberwar, There Are No Rules
• Zeadally and Flowers - Cyberwar: The What, When, Why and How [Commentary]
• Zuboff - The Age of Surveillance Capitalism