Semester of Graduation

Fall 2025

Degree

Master of Science (MS)

Department

School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Division of Computer Science & Engineering

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

Amid growing concerns over data privacy in web and mobile applications, this study aims to assess the privacy mechanisms in instant games on Facebook, a platform with approximately 3.03 billion monthly active users and a substantial repository of personal data. Instant Games have become increasingly popular due to their ease of access and social integration features. Investigating these games can provide insights into privacy mechanisms and practices, thereby informing the development of more fair, compliant, and user privacy-centric gaming experiences. Thus, this study proposes an integrated analytical framework that leverages a combination of descriptive, memory, and network analysis techniques to examine privacy mechanisms in Facebook Instant Games. It focuses on evaluating the permission model, default settings, configurations, and API usage, as well as their impact on user data access, transfer, and sharing. Our findings uncover discrepancies between privacy policies and actual user data notices. Through generalized settings and lack of explicit consent mechanism, our study reveals a system that often favors functionality over user privacy. Moreover, we highlight the reliance on powerful APIs that, while enhancing gameplay, pose additional privacy risks by granting broad data access to third-party services without direct user approval.

Date

10-26-2025

Committee Chair

Ali-Gombe Aisha

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