Digital Sovereignty Lab

DigiSoul – the Digital Sovereignty Lab led by Prof. Dr. Karola Marky, has been part of the Faculty of Computer Science at the Ruhr University Bochum since 2022. The Chair is associated with the Horst Görtz Institute for IT Security (HGI), and the Cluster of Excellence for Cyber Security (CASA).

Prof. Dr. Karola Marky als Key-Note-Speakerin auf der akademischen Jahresfeier der RUB - © RUB, Marquard

DigiSoul’s research is primarily focused on the intersection of cybersecurity and privacy research with human factors. We specifically investigate the capacity of individuals (e.g., end-users or developers), institutions (e.g., universities or companies), or states (e.g., administrations or governments) for informational self-determination. The current landscape of cybersecurity and privacy solutions often lacks an in-depth consideration of different user groups. A consequence of that is that cybersecurity in real-world scenarios is seen as a cumbersome barrier between the users and their goals. DigiSoul aims to break this barrier by creating cybersecurity and privacy solutions that go hand-in-hand with the users‘ goals. 

The core expertise of DigiSoul is two-fold:

(1) We cover the engineering perspective by proposing novel solutions in the form of new protocols, algorithms, and technical concepts considering state-of-the-art security and privacy engineering models (incl. threat models, trust assumptions, etc.) to provide realistic protection of the users. Here, we also investigate emerging technology, such as extended reality or artificial intelligence.

(2) We motivate and evaluate these the cybersecurity and privacy solutions in in-depth empirical evaluations. To make sure cybersecurity and privacy solutions are actually fit for daily life, we integrate the prospective users in each step of the engineering process ranging from the elicitation of requirements through interviews or focus groups, controlled experiments in our interaction lab to in-the-wild investigations to make sure that the solutions actually work in the users‘ daily lives.Combining both perspectives – security/privacy engineering and empirical evaluation – is essential in our digital sovereignty research to create solutions that fit the security demands of our modern society and user goals in everyday life scenarios.

Contact

Claudia Weiss

E-mail: digisoul@rub.de

Phone: +49 (0) 234 32 12102

Postal Address

Ruhr University Bochum
Faculty of Computer Science
Digital Sovereignty Lab
Universitätsstraße 150
44801 Bochum

Directions

The Digital Sovereignty Lab is located in building MB, 2.79 – 2.85. Directions can be found here.