Communications of the ACM
Gauging the Risk of Fraud From Social Media
A researcher working to link people's social media accounts to data compiled by the government says that "people's privacy is reduced, but the purpose makes it ethically justifiable, as combating fraud is in everyone's interests."
Credit: University of Twente (Netherlands)
Maurice van Keulen, a researcher at the University of Twente’s Center for Telematics and Information Technology, is working to enable more accurate predictions of a person's risk of fraudulent behavior by linking social media data with government data.
The first challenge is to link a person's social media account definitively to data compiled by the Netherlands' Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment. University of Twente's Henry Been has shown that it is possible to link people to their Twitter accounts using personal data such as name, language spoken, and address, although he has not actually linked anyone to a Twitter account yet, maintaining that it is only a question of time and additional research. Been co-authored a paper on the ethical aspects of his research, concluding that "people’s privacy is reduced, but the purpose makes it ethically justifiable, as combating fraud is in everyone’s interests."
Van Keulen intends to expand the research by appointing a Ph.D. student to work with the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment on fraud prediction.
From University of Twente (Netherlands)
View Full Article
Abstracts Copyright © 2013 Information Inc., Bethesda, Maryland, USA
No entries found