@inproceedings{ErmakovaFabianBenderetal.2018, author = {Ermakova, Tatiana and Fabian, Benjamin and Bender, Benedict and Klimek, Kerstin}, title = {Web Tracking}, series = {Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS 51)}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS 51)}, publisher = {HICSS Conference Office University of Hawaii at Manoa}, address = {Maile Way}, issn = {2572-6862}, doi = {10.24251/HICSS.2018.596}, pages = {4732 -- 4741}, year = {2018}, abstract = {Web tracking seems to become ubiquitous in online business and leads to increased privacy concerns of users. This paper provides an overview over the current state of the art of web-tracking research, aiming to reveal the relevance and methodologies of this research area and creates a foundation for future work. In particular, this study addresses the following research questions: What methods are followed? What results have been achieved so far? What are potential future research areas? For these goals, a structured literature review based upon an established methodological framework is conducted. The identified articles are investigated with respect to the applied research methodologies and the aspects of web tracking they emphasize.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{BenderFabianHauptetal.2018, author = {Bender, Benedict and Fabian, Benjamin and Haupt, Johannes and Neumann, Tom}, title = {Track and Treat}, series = {Twenty-Sixth European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2018)}, booktitle = {Twenty-Sixth European Conference on Information Systems (ECIS 2018)}, pages = {14}, year = {2018}, abstract = {E-Mail tracking mechanisms gather information on individual recipients' reading behavior. Previous studies show that e-mail newsletters commonly include tracking elements. However, prior work does not examine the degree to which e-mail senders actually employ gathered user information. The paper closes this research gap by means of an experimental study to clarify the use of tracking-based infor- mation. To that end, twelve mail accounts are created, each of which subscribes to a pre-defined set of newsletters from companies based in Germany, the UK, and the USA. Systematically varying e-mail reading patterns across accounts, each account simulates a different type of user with individual read- ing behavior. Assuming senders to track e-mail reading habits, we expect changes in mailer behavior. The analysis confirms the prominence of tracking in that over 92\% of the newsletter e-mails contain tracking images. For 13 out of 44 senders an adjustment of communication policy in response to user reading behavior is observed. Observed effects include sending newsletters at different times, adapting advertised products to match the users' IT environment, increased or decreased mailing frequency, and mobile-specific adjustments. Regarding legal issues, not all companies that adapt the mail-sending behavior state the usage of such mechanisms in their privacy policy.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{KurbelNowakAzodietal.2015, author = {Kurbel, Karl and Nowak, Dawid and Azodi, Amir and Jaeger, David and Meinel, Christoph and Cheng, Feng and Sapegin, Andrey and Gawron, Marian and Morelli, Frank and Stahl, Lukas and Kerl, Stefan and Janz, Mariska and Hadaya, Abdulmasih and Ivanov, Ivaylo and Wiese, Lena and Neves, Mariana and Schapranow, Matthieu-Patrick and F{\"a}hnrich, Cindy and Feinbube, Frank and Eberhardt, Felix and Hagen, Wieland and Plauth, Max and Herscheid, Lena and Polze, Andreas and Barkowsky, Matthias and Dinger, Henriette and Faber, Lukas and Montenegro, Felix and Czach{\´o}rski, Tadeusz and Nycz, Monika and Nycz, Tomasz and Baader, Galina and Besner, Veronika and Hecht, Sonja and Schermann, Michael and Krcmar, Helmut and Wiradarma, Timur Pratama and Hentschel, Christian and Sack, Harald and Abramowicz, Witold and Sokolowska, Wioletta and Hossa, Tymoteusz and Opalka, Jakub and Fabisz, Karol and Kubaczyk, Mateusz and Cmil, Milena and Meng, Tianhui and Dadashnia, Sharam and Niesen, Tim and Fettke, Peter and Loos, Peter and Perscheid, Cindy and Schwarz, Christian and Schmidt, Christopher and Scholz, Matthias and Bock, Nikolai and Piller, Gunther and B{\"o}hm, Klaus and Norkus, Oliver and Clark, Brian and Friedrich, Bj{\"o}rn and Izadpanah, Babak and Merkel, Florian and Schweer, Ilias and Zimak, Alexander and Sauer, J{\"u}rgen and Fabian, Benjamin and Tilch, Georg and M{\"u}ller, David and Pl{\"o}ger, Sabrina and Friedrich, Christoph M. and Engels, Christoph and Amirkhanyan, Aragats and van der Walt, Est{\´e}e and Eloff, J. H. P. and Scheuermann, Bernd and Weinknecht, Elisa}, title = {HPI Future SOC Lab}, editor = {Meinel, Christoph and Polze, Andreas and Oswald, Gerhard and Strotmann, Rolf and Seibold, Ulrich and Schulzki, Bernhard}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:517-opus4-102516}, pages = {iii, 154}, year = {2015}, abstract = {Das Future SOC Lab am HPI ist eine Kooperation des Hasso-Plattner-Instituts mit verschiedenen Industriepartnern. Seine Aufgabe ist die Erm{\"o}glichung und F{\"o}rderung des Austausches zwischen Forschungsgemeinschaft und Industrie. Am Lab wird interessierten Wissenschaftlern eine Infrastruktur von neuester Hard- und Software kostenfrei f{\"u}r Forschungszwecke zur Verf{\"u}gung gestellt. Dazu z{\"a}hlen teilweise noch nicht am Markt verf{\"u}gbare Technologien, die im normalen Hochschulbereich in der Regel nicht zu finanzieren w{\"a}ren, bspw. Server mit bis zu 64 Cores und 2 TB Hauptspeicher. Diese Angebote richten sich insbesondere an Wissenschaftler in den Gebieten Informatik und Wirtschaftsinformatik. Einige der Schwerpunkte sind Cloud Computing, Parallelisierung und In-Memory Technologien. In diesem Technischen Bericht werden die Ergebnisse der Forschungsprojekte des Jahres 2015 vorgestellt. Ausgew{\"a}hlte Projekte stellten ihre Ergebnisse am 15. April 2015 und 4. November 2015 im Rahmen der Future SOC Lab Tag Veranstaltungen vor.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{FabianBenderWeimann2015, author = {Fabian, Benjamin and Bender, Benedict and Weimann, Lars}, title = {E-Mail tracking in online marketing}, series = {Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Wirtschaftsinformatik}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 12th International Conference on Wirtschaftsinformatik}, number = {74}, publisher = {Associations for Information Systems AIS}, address = {Atlanta}, isbn = {978-3-00-049184-9}, pages = {15}, year = {2015}, abstract = {E-Mail tracking uses personalized links and pictures for gathering information on user behavior, for example, where, when, on what kind of device, and how often an e-mail has been read. This information can be very useful for marketing purposes. On the other hand, privacy and security requirements of customers could be violated by tracking. This paper examines how e-mail tracking works, how it can be detected automatically, and to what extent it is used in German e-commerce. We develop a detection model and software tool in order to collect and analyze more than 600 newsletter e-mails from companies of several different industries. The results show that the usage of e-mail tracking in Germany is prevalent but also varies depending on the industry.}, language = {en} } @inproceedings{BenderFabianLessmannetal.2016, author = {Bender, Benedict and Fabian, Benjamin and Lessmann, Stefan and Haupt, Johannes}, title = {E-Mail Tracking}, series = {Proceedings of the 37th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS)}, booktitle = {Proceedings of the 37th International Conference on Information Systems (ICIS)}, pages = {19}, year = {2016}, abstract = {E-mail advertisement, as one instrument in the marketing mix, allows companies to collect fine-grained behavioural data about individual users' e-mail reading habits realised through sophisticated tracking mechanisms. Such tracking can be harmful for user privacy and security. This problem is especially severe since e-mail tracking techniques gather data without user consent. Striving to increase privacy and security in e-mail communication, the paper makes three contributions. First, a large database of newsletter e-mails is developed. This data facilitates investigating the prevalence of e- mail tracking among 300 global enterprises from Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States. Second, countermeasures are developed for automatically identifying and blocking e-mail tracking mechanisms without impeding the user experience. The approach consists of identifying important tracking descriptors and creating a neural network-based detection model. Last, the effectiveness of the proposed approach is established by means of empirical experimentation. The results suggest a classification accuracy of 99.99\%.}, language = {en} }