Instructor Information

Preferred Method of Communication & Response Time

• Preferred method of communication: If you need to contact me directly, my preferred method of communication is email. You can expect to receive a response within two business days (i.e., not over the weekend). If I email you directly, please strive to respond within two business days. It is recommended that you check your NC State email at least once a day to stay on top of course communications.
• Asking questions about the course: If you have a question about the course or its content, you can email me or post your question on Piazza. You can expect to receive a response within one business days (i.e. not over the weekend).
• Email guidelines: Always include a descriptive, specific but concise subject. Always include the course number in your email, and provide adequate context for your question in order to ensure full understanding of your email. Be sure to use your NC State email account, and sign in with your name and Student ID number.

Course Information

Catalog Description

Privacy is a growing concern in our modern society. We interact and share our personal information with a wide variety of organizations, including financial and healthcare institutions, web service providers and social networks. Many times such personal information is inappropriately collected, used or shared, often without our awareness. This course introduces privacy in a broad sense, with the aim of providing students an overview of the challenging and emerging research topics in privacy. This course will expose students to many of the issues that privacy engineers, program managers, researchers and designers deal with in industry. ST 370 is recommended but not mandatory.

By the end of the course, students will learn about the following areas in privacy:

• Data privacy: the motivations for data privacy and common implementations (e.g., k-anonymity, differential privacy).
• Online privacy: online tracking and anonymous communication systems.
• Opportunities and challenges of applying AI/ML for privacy.
• Side-channel threats: Emerging side-channel attacks.
• Privacy acts: privacy regulations, frameworks and compliance/auditing tools.
• Usable privacy: perceptions of privacy, privacy attitudes, privacy preferences.

Structure

The majority of this course is synchronous, delivered through real-time, face-to-face class sessions. Additional materials and activities are delivered through Moodle, a secure and easy-to-use online learning platform.

The learning activities in this course will include completing assignments and quizzes, reading narrated PowerPoint presentations, participating in discussion forums, and engaging in group projects and exams.

This course consists of 6 modules. Most modules last about two weeks while a few may require three weeks to cover all topics. Assignments typically have a turnaround time of about two weeks.

Meeting Time and Tool Used

In-person meeting in the classroom. Project updates with the instructor will be conducted via Zoom.

Prerequisites/Corequisites

Prerequisites: CSC 316 (ST 370 is recommended)
Informal: You need to have some understanding on (1) basic concepts on statistics and probability and (2) basics of systems implementation (e.g., web, distributed systems, networking, etc.). If you do not have a basic understanding of these areas, you may have difficulty with certain parts of the course. If you have questions regarding these prerequisites, please contact the instructor.

Minimum Technical and Digital Information Literacy Skills

Required technical skills

• Navigate and use Moodle, NC State’s Learning Management System
• Use Gmail, including attaching files to email messages
• Create and submit files in commonly used word processing program formats (MS Word, text editors, Latex, Google Docs)
• Download and install software as needed (see section on required software)
• Download and upload attachments
• Use presentations and programming editors in digital environments
• Use web conferencing tools including Zoom
• Post to discussion boards and forums like Piazza

Required digital information literacy skills

• Perform online research using various search engines and library databases (e.g., Google Scholar)
• Use open-source code, tools and data (e.g., from GitHub) for research purposes
• Prepare a presentation on research findings
• Properly cite information sources while generating project reports
• Upload research artifacts used for course projects to NCSU GitHub or Google drive

General Education Program (GEP) Information

• GEP Category Fulfilled: None
• GEP Corequisites: None

Learning Outcomes

By the end of this course, students will be able to:

• Execute data deanonymization attack
• Apply techniques to anonymize personally identifiable information (PII) in databases
• Generate differentially private responses
• Apply private information retrieval (PIR) scheme
• Distinguish and filter online tracking traffic
• Contrast different online tracking techniques
• Explain how anonymous communication networks work and how they help users preserve their online anonymity
• Demonstrate privacy attacks on machine learning models
• Design privacy-preserving federated learning
• Compute statistical parity for machine learning models
• Contrast privacy regulations
• Design usable privacy policy template
• Compare and contrast users' attitudes and perceptions of privacy

Course Material

This course has no formal textbook. The course readings will come from online book chapters, seminal papers, and other informative sources. Slides will serve as the main reading resource summarizing the lecture content.

Here are some useful online books that provide additional information:

• Carmela Troncoso Privacy and Online Rights
• Lazar et al. Research Methods in Human-Computer Interaction
• Daniel Solove. Understanding Privacy
• Daniel J. Solove and Paul M. Schwartz. Consumer Privacy and Data Protection
• Helen Nissenbaum. Privacy in Context

Technology Requirements

Computers

A laptop computer is required for students taking this course. NC State’s Online and Distance Education provides technology requirements and recommendations for computer hardware, and NC State’s Office of Information Technology provides recommendations for your computer at NC State.

Software and digitally-hosted course components

Following software will be required/used for the course.

• Moodle and Wolfware
  • Moodle Accessibility Statement
  • Moodle Privacy Policy
• Panopto
  • Panopto Accessibility Statement
  • Panopto Privacy Policy
• Piazza
  • Piazza Accessibility Statement
  • Piazza Privacy Policy
• GradeScope
  • GradeScope Accessibility Statement
  • GradeScope Privacy Policy
• Zoom
  • Zoom Accessibility Statement
  • Zoom Privacy Policy

Other Student Expenses

None

Communication Guidelines

Respecting our learning community

The NC State Code of Student Conduct outlines expectations for behavior in the classroom (whether virtual or physical) and the consequences for students who violate these expectations. Any behavior that impacts other students’ ability to learn and succeed will be addressed, but expressing diverse viewpoints and interpretations of course content is welcome.

Community guidelines for this course include:

• Use a respectful tone in all forms of communication (email, written, oral, visual)
• Maintain professionalism (avoid slang, poor grammar, etc.) in your written communication
• Respect regional dialects and culturally embedded ways of oral communication
• Stay home or in your dorm room if you are exhibiting symptoms of a contagious illness (fever, chills, etc.)
• Enter our virtual and/or physical classroom community respectfully by refraining from lewd or indecent speech or behavior, helping to maintain a safe physical environment, not using your cell phone for voice or text communication except when explicitly given leave to do so, and not attending class under the influence of any substance
• Treat each community member with respect by not recording others without their consent or engaging in any form of hazing, harassment, intimidation, or abuse
• Respect cultural differences that may influence communication styles and needs

Plan for interaction between instructors and students

Course related announcements and online class discussion will occur via Piazza. It is the responsibility of the student to sign up for an account. Questions to the instructor or TA should occur in Piazza unless there is a reason not to. The instructor or the TA will do their best to respond to questions in Piazza within one business day. When appropriate, make the question viewable to everyone so that the answer can benefit all students. For sensitive matters (e.g., grading), email the instructor and/or TA. Whenever emailing the TA about grading concerns, please CC the instructor.

The instructor will meet with each project group over Zoom to assess their progress and provide advice midway through the semester.

Expectations for learner participation and interaction

Some course activities include Moodle quizzes which students need to complete in class. Some lectures will involve synchronous group work that will require you to interact with other students in the course. Most classes will involve student discussions where students are expected to engage with the instructor.

Grading and Feedback

Grading criteria, details, and timing of feedback

The course will consist of exams, home assignments (worst graded one will be dropped) and a course project.

Grading scale

The final letter grade will be based on the final percentage as follows (final fractional number will be rounded to the nearest integer):

REG 02.50.03 (Grades and Grade Point Average) describes the grade point interpretation of letter grades.

Course Schedule

See the course schedule. Note that the schedule is subject to change as the semester evolves.

Course Policies

Proctored exams

DE students should receive or contact "Exams For EOL" examsforeol@ncsu.edu to schedule a proctoring service for the midterm and final exams. The exact dates of the exams are already hosted in the detailed course schedule.

On-campus students requiring special assistantship for exams should contact the NCSU DRO office and schedule exams through them.

Late assignments

No late assignments will be accepted. Students with legitimate reasons who contact the professor before the deadline may apply for an extension.

Re-grade Policy

No re-grading requests will be honored after one weeks of releasing the grade for any assignment/report/project. If you see any issues with the grading, please contact the instructor within one weeks of releasing the grade.

Incomplete grades, withdrawals

If an extended deadline is not authorized by the instructor or department, an unfinished incomplete grade will automatically change to an 'F' after either (a) the end of the next regular semester in which the student is enrolled (not including summer sessions), or (b) the end of 12 months if the student is not enrolled, whichever is shorter. Incompletes that change to 'F' will count as an attempted course on transcripts. The burden of fulfilling an incomplete grade is the responsibility of the student. The university policy on incomplete grades is located at http://policies.ncsu.edu/regulation/reg-02-50-3.

If the student must withdraw from a course or from the University due to hardship beyond their control, see Withdrawal Process and Timeline | Student Services Center for information and instructions.

Attendance

The instructor will not take formal attendance for class meetings. However, a portion of the grade is based on class participation, including pop quizzes at the end of random lectures. Students should seek permission from the instructor for anticipated or unanticipated absences and discuss potential makeup options. Note: Excuses for unanticipated absences must be presented to the instructor within one week after the return to class.

The university policy on excused absences will be observed (see http://policies.ncsu.edu/regulation/reg-02-20-03). The students are responsible for discussing makeup exams if they miss exams due to excused absence. The instructor will choose a mutually agreed date and time for the makeup exam. Late submission of homework assignments due to excused absences is not subject to the policies on late assignments.

University Policies

Academic integrity and honesty

Students are required to comply with the university policy on academic integrity found in the Code of Student Conduct 11.35.01 sections 8 and 9. Therefore, students are required to uphold the Pack Pledge: “I have neither given nor received unauthorized aid on this test or assignment.” Violations of academic integrity will be handled in accordance with the Student Discipline Procedures.

Please refer to the Academic Integrity web page for a detailed explanation of the University’s policies on academic integrity and some of the common understandings related to those policies.

The instructor expects honesty in the completion of test and assignments. The instructor has a zero-tolerance policy for violations of academic integrity. The instructor carefully monitors for instances of offenses such as plagiarism and illegal collaboration, so it is very important that students use their best possible judgement in meeting this policy. If identified the instructor will assign the 'F' grade and refer the student to the appropriate University bodies for possible further action.

Note that students are explicitly forbidden to copy anything off the Internet (e.g., source code, text) for the purposes of completing an assignment or the final project (including using emering large language models like ChatGPT). Also, students are forbidden from collaborating on any assignment except were explicitly allowed in writing by the instructor.

Ethical considerations

This course considers topics involving personal and public privacy and security. As part of this investigation we will cover technologies whose abuse may infringe on the rights of others. As an instructor, I rely on the ethical use of these technologies. Unethical use may include circumvention of existing security or privacy measurements for any purpose, or the dissemination, promotion, or exploitation of vulnerabilities of these services. Exceptions to these guidelines may occur in the process of reporting vulnerabilities through public and authoritative channels. Any activity outside the letter or spirit of these guidelines will be reported to the proper authorities and may result in dismissal from the class. Please refer to the ACM code of ethics and professional conduct for more details.

When in doubt, please contact the course professor for advice. Do not undertake any action which could be perceived as technology misuse anywhere and/or under any circumstances unless you have received explicit permission from the instructor.

Student privacy

• Originality Checking Software: Gradescope is being used in this course to detect the originality of student submissions.
• Class recording statement: In-class sessions are recorded in such a way that might also record students in this course. These recordings will NOT be used beyond the current semester or in any other setting outside of the course.
• Class privacy statement: This course requires online exchanges among students and the instructor, but NOT with persons outside the course. Students may be required to disclose personally identifiable information to other students in the course, via electronic tools like email or web postings, where relevant to the course. Examples include online discussions of class topics and posting of student coursework. All students are expected to respect the privacy of each other by not sharing or using such information outside the course.

Trans inclusive syllabi act

In an effort to affirm and respect the identities of transgender students in the classroom and beyond, please contact me if you wish to be referred to using a name and/or pronouns other than what is listed in the student directory.

Other Policies

Students are responsible for reviewing the NC State University PRR’s which pertain to their course rights and responsibilities:

• Equal Opportunity and Non-Discrimination Policy Statement and additional references
• Code of Student Conduct
• Grades and Grade Point Average
• Credit-Only Courses
• Audits

Student Resources

Academic and Student Affairs maintains a website with links for student support on campus, including academic support, community support, health and wellness, financial hardship or insecurity, and more. Find Help on Campus.

Disability resources

Reasonable accommodations will be made for students with verifiable disabilities. In order to take advantage of available accommodations, students must register with the Disability Resource Office (DRO). For more information on NC State’s policy on working with students with disabilities, please see the Policies, Rules and Regulations page maintained by the DRO and REG 02.20.01 Academic Accommodations for Students with Disabilities.

Safe at NC State

At NC State, we take the health and safety of students, faculty and staff seriously. The Office for Institutional Equity and Diversity supports the university community by providing services and resources to support and guide individuals in obtaining the help they need. See the Safe at NC State webpage for resources.

Supporting Fellow Students in Distress

As members of the NC State Wolfpack community, we each share a personal responsibility to express concern for one another and to ensure that this classroom and the campus as a whole remain a healthy and safe environment for learning. Occasionally, you may come across a fellow classmate whose personal behavior concerns or worries you, either for the classmate’s well-being or yours. If you feel this way, I would encourage you to report this behavior to the NC State CARES website. Although you can report anonymously, it is preferred that you share your contact information so they can follow up with you personally.

Course Evaluations

ClassEval is the end-of-semester survey for students to evaluate the instruction of all university classes. The current survey is administered online and includes 12 closed-ended questions and 3 open-ended questions. Deans, department heads, and instructors may add a limited number of their own questions to these 15 common-core questions.

Online class evaluations will be available for students to complete during the last two weeks of the semester for full-semester courses and the last week of shorter sessions. Students will receive an email directing them to a website to complete class evaluations. These become unavailable at 8 am on the first day of finals.

Health and Well-Being Resources

These are difficult times, and academic and personal stress is a natural result. Everyone is encouraged to take care of themselves and their peers. If you need additional support, there are many resources on campus to help you:

• Counseling Center
• Health Center
• If the personal behavior of a classmate concerns or worries you, either for the classmate’s well-being or yours, we encourage you to report this behavior to the NC State CARES team
• If you or someone you know are experiencing food, housing or financial insecurity, please see the Pack Essentials Program

Syllabus Modification Statement

Our syllabus represents a flexible agreement. It outlines the topics we will cover and the order in which we will cover them. Dates for assignments represent the earliest possible time they would be due. The pace of the class depends on student mastery and interests. Thus minor changes in the syllabus can occur if we need to slow down or speed up the pace of instruction.