Privacy in mobile learning applications: user privacy concerns and implications of applying privacy by design approach

This thesis investigates the privacy risks that m-learning app users face by identifying the personal information that m-learning apps collect from their users, and the privacy policies of these apps. It reveals that most of the m-learning applications have similar privacy policies, which seem to protect the interest of the providers rather than the users. The Privacy by Design framework is reviewed to determine whether it can help the developers address user privacy practices. The results from the sample of 260 participants suggest that users are less concerned with the collection of personal information that is non-identifiable. The survey also revealed that the users are more concerned when an app shares their personal information with third parties for commercial purposes than when it is shared with the government.