A User Study of an ABAC Model for Online Social Networks

This paper provides an evaluation of the attribute based access control model called ABAC–TG for online social networks (OSNs). This model comprehensively considers user and object attributes and two main social attributes: trust and gossip, which are calculated based on the Ego node (the user sharing the information) point of view. An earlier version of this paper formally presents the ABAC-TG model, including rules, attribute definitions, and examples of use cases. As part of the study, users were asked to give their opinions and feedback regarding the rules governing the ABAC-TG model and how they perceive the current Facebook permission model. The survey results indicate the importance of using personal attributes and especially the gossiping attribute in determining the desired permissions model. An earlier version of this paper appeared, but the user study reported here is entirely new.