Plenary: How to Become an Internet Felon in Three Easy Steps

Wednesday 13:30 - 14:15.

Barbara Simons

The ease with which digitized intellectual property can be duplicated, distributed, and accessed on the Internet has generated fear and misunderstanding of the net. These concerns have prompted legislation and regulations that could have the effect of restricting access to information and reducing privacy on the Internet.

The Internet has no national boundaries, and there is no international consensus on how to balance users' rights to privacy and users' rights to protection of their intellectual property. Legislation has been proposed throughout the world that could seriously affect the way that HCI professionals design and deliver interactive technologies.

Barbara Simons will describe some of the resulting potential dangers for HCI professionals and general users of the Internet. She will review current battles over copyright protections and privacy, and will describe how such laws could change the nature of our work.

Barbara Simons earned her Ph.D. in computer science from the University of California, Berkeley. She served as Senior Technology Advisor for IBM Global Services. Ms. Simons is a Fellow of ACM and of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). She was elected president of ACM in 1998.

Ms. Simons is a winner of the 1998 EFF Pioneer Award. In 1995, CNET selected her as one of its 26 Internet "Visionaries"; in 1994 Open Computing named her as one of the top 100 women in computing; and in 1992 she was awarded the CPSR Norbert Wiener Award for Professional and Social Responsibility in Computing. Science Magazine featured her in a special edition on women in science in 1992.