... research1.1
Particularly that funded by the National Health and Medical Research Council and some other public bodies.
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...Brownsword:2008bj,Friedman:2002kx1.2
Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com) also shows over 1200 citations of this text within scholarly papers within its database. Almost every text referred to within this thesis that has any mention of the subject of informed consent cites this book: those that do not were published beforehand.
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... technology1.3
Distraction, ignorance, being overwhelmed, or not caring all contribute to the problems discussed in Chapter 2, and being overwhelmed, or ``numbness'', is a particular cause for concern that motivates much of Chapters 3 and 4.
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... technology.1.4
It is currently almost impossible for technology to tell who exactly is using a computer at any given time; is it the person logged in? Or their child? Or their ill grandmother? Any such competence tests could be easily circumvented, since there is rarely any person-to-person interaction and usually only person-to-computer interaction. Future easily available technology could improve this, with, say, retinal scanning, but for now it is extremely uncommon for technology to feature such measures.
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... intentional1.5
Faden and Beauchamp use the term ``intentionality'' throughout their analysis, although most of the time they appear to mean simply ``intention'', rather than the concept from philosophy of mind that refers to a referential property. They refer to intention throughout their discourse, and although they appeal to such writers as Alvin Goldman and John Searle, who are known for writing about intention and intentionality, the concepts they use are those generally associated with the use of intention, rather than discussing the more complex philosophical idea. It is important to note that I do not wish to make any claims about any deeper philosophical questions surrounding intentionality, and wish instead to restrict my discourse to the simpler concept.
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... it1.6
Faden and Beauchamp give the example of intending ``to take our medicine, but never [getting] around to it'' (p. 242).
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... clumsy1.7
Except for the problem of the mess of the spilled coffee.
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... consent1.8
To be discussed in section 1.2.2.
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... controlled1.9
Faden and Beauchamp discuss persuasion, manipulation, and coercion in their forms quite thoroughly; without going into further detail about the intricacies of persuasion and other forms of manipulation, which is outside the scope of this thesis, I will adopt their definitions and use of the words, despite some issues with these definitions. Some issues include the problem of `forced persuasion' as put forward by Appelbaum and Roth (1983), or degrees of persuasion, which Faden and Beauchamp count as manipulation. In particular, Faden and Beauchamp wish to distance themselves from the traditional psychological definitions of these terms (note 28, p. 377), especially the lack of distinction psychology makes between psychological manipulation and persuasion. At any rate, the use of the manipulation scale by Faden and Beauchamp is reasonable and practical for their arguments, and for mine.
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... background1.10
This is often disclosed deep in the End User License Agreement, but Chapters 2 and 3 show how this isn't enough to constitute anything but deception.
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... parties1.11
In this case the users consider having the software more important than the loss of their privacy, and knowingly give it up.
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... similar1.12
It could be argued that the Free Software movement [Free Software Foundation, 2008], as an extreme example of recommendation, could be considered indoctrination, but that is the subject of another paper.
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...Brooke:1988yq,Sullivan:1988kx1.13
In information technology these sorts of situations also occur (especially with minors and mentally ill computer users), so this is a problem for this field as well, and one tricky to overcome. There are major difficulties in working out competence over a technological medium, and even if competence is assessed, non-competent users, especially minors, can often and easily bypass competence tests, such as requests for date of birth, in order to achieve the outcome desired. This is not something I wish to dwell on particularly in this thesis, since it is extremely difficult and complicated; my main aim is to look at improving the current consent situation for competent users rather than working out how to accurately gauge competence.
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... apply1.14
For example, quarantine, fluoridated water, etc.
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... autonomy1.15
It is possible there could be further conceptions of autonomy, which could be linked to informed consent in the future, and which would cause us to reconsider autonomy as a basis for informed consent, but these are the conceptions that are appealed to currently when dealing with informed consent.
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... action1.16
Appelbaum et al. (1987) aim simply for an autonomous person, as seen above.
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... here1.17
Although it could be argued that this would not necessarily qualify as a morally worthwhile freedom of choice; the fact is that it is possible and consistent.
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... relatively1.18
At least, when compared with face-to-face personal interactions such as doctor-patient situations, for example.
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...competence2.1
Whether the rudimentary approaches for assessment of this competence that are used in EULAs can really be constituted as sufficient for the purposes of Faden and Beauchamp's consent model is something that will be discussed later.
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...StopBadware:2008oq2.2
I go on to discuss StopBadware in more detail in section 4.2.2.
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... widget2.3
Facebook is a popular social networking Website which allows third parties to make little applications (``widgets'') that run within the site.
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... thesis)2.4
Unfortunately, all this is after Zango has attempted to clean up their image and improve their consent procedures - they are said to be seeking certification as part of the TRUSTe Certified Trusted Download scheme, which requires certain provisions be met before they can be certified as a ``safe'' application (i.e. not spyware, respects the privacy of the individual, etc.), and it seems that so far they are meeting only the minimum requirements for this certification as far as informed consent is concerned. A discussion of the TRUSTe certification scheme and its suitability for informed consent governance can be found in section 4.2.4 of this thesis.
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... clauses2.5
See Appendix 2 for the text of the clauses.
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... Design3.1
Discussed in the following section.
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...distracting3.2
EULAs wouldn't be considered distracting because they are expected in the course of installing a piece of software. Cookies, on the other hand, are frequent, numerous, and annoying to have to deal with one at a time.
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... space''3.3
I assume this means that if, say, privacy and security are conflicting values to some degree, the design needs to take this into account and work to mitigate as much of the conflict as possible; Friedman et al. do not elaborate on this.
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... habits3.4
Solving the problem of cookie numbness is outside the scope of this thesis, but a very valid and difficult problem to solve. I expect that without a complete redesign of information management within Web browsers, any solution to improve informed consent in cookies will be unsuccessful.
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... understood3.5
Although, as we saw earlier, there are significant problems with the use of disclosure alone.
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... accordingly3.6
For example, for Zango, legal language is highly unsuitable for use in communicating the terms and conditions of installing its software. Instead, perhaps, a combination of less formal, easy to read (yet still legally viable) language coupled with descriptive images would be more appropriate. Chapter 4 goes into more detail on suggestions like this.
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... rootkit3.7
A rootkit is a piece of software that runs invisibly on the operating system, allowing for malicious software to take advantage of built-in operating system code running at a higher privilege level than that of the user.
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... software3.8
If a third-party-governed standard for, say, license agreements were established, there could be equivalent set of basic standards for different jurisdictions. This is discussed further in Chapter 4.
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... agreement4.1
Whether or not they have read the agreement, ticking the box entitles the requester to assume it has been read and understood.
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... horses4.2
Malicious software that ``hides'' inside legitimate-looking software, installing invisibly when the legitimate-looking software is installed. The rootkit, discussed previously, is also a type of Trojan horse.
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... software4.3
Because most people have no obvious major reason to install or use it, and those who do are ones that are already likely aware of the dangers of EULAs. Also, the version that checks EULAs on the fly is only available to paying customers, which raises the acceptance and use threshold even higher.
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... Admo4.4
This is a completely fictional piece of software, but one that might be found ``in the wild''.
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... added4.5
In real estate standard rental agreement terms, this is the additional list of rules for the tenant that is usually attached to the standard agreement, such as ``no hanging of posters'', etc.
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