Security by Obscurity

The magazine ‘future’ asked a Data Science lecturer of the St. Pölten UAS how concerned he is with the protection of his personal data, what he does to guard them, and how liberal he (sometimes) is with them.

Handling of data:

In my company, I often deal with the protection of customer data. When it comes to my private life, I limit the information I provide in social media. I usually refuse memberships and customer cards.

Protection of personal data:

I use temporary e-mail addresses for online registrations and always try to fill in only mandatory fields. My private data are stored only on my private computer and are encoded in the cloud. Furthermore, I try to limit the amount of interesting content that I post online. This is referred to as “security by obscurity”.

(Liberal) handling of personal data:

Sometimes there is no other way: many companies and websites have my telephone number and e-mail address. I share my name and photo for this interview. If I don’t want to disclose certain things from my times as a student, I should delete my Facebook account – also, I shouldn’t mention this in this interview. But then, I want to have a life, too.

Thomas Delissen

Thomas Delissen, MSc is an artificial intelligence expert with Capgemini Consulting Austria and a lecturer in the study programme Data Science and Business Analytics at the St. Pölten UAS.

• Full edition of the UAS magazine ‘future‘ 11 (in German)