Privacy for Groups Online: Context Matters

The pervasive influence of online activities in our lives, encompassing personal connections, professional engagements, and e-commerce, has amplified concerns about privacy. However, existing privacy research has predominantly concentrated on the individual level, paying less attention to the privacy practices and strategies adopted by online social groups. This research gap calls for a renewed focus on understanding and addressing privacy challenges specific to online group settings. In this paper we explore the privacy needs of online groups through the lens of Contextual Integrity. We perform two complementary studies: semi-structured qualitative interviews of Facebook Groups users (n=17), and a large-scale survey of individuals organizing in groups on Facebook, Discord, and Reddit (n=4486). We investigate the privacy needs of different contextual groups, and locate the presence of contextual norms, contextual member roles, explicit and implicit rules, and privacy concerns. We trace how this complex interplay informs privacy expectations, needs, and negotiations across groups. We find that technical systems provide limited tools to effectively enforce group privacy, allowing individuals to compromise privacy norms. Based on these findings, we offer recommendations to support the design of privacy controls for online groups.