add research questions

expose/Expose - Masterthesis - Carsten Porth.tex

@@ -33,7 +33,7 @@ accentcolor=tud1c,
 	\textbf{Allocation Date:} & xx.xx.2018 \\
 	\textbf{Supervisor:} & Jörg Daubert \\
 	\textbf{Second Supervisor:} &  Aidmar Wainakh \\
-	\textbf{Category for Digilib:} & \\
+	\textbf{Category for Digilib:} & S \\
 \end{tabular}
 
 
@@ -51,6 +51,11 @@ Especially in social networks, a lot of data is collected by the respective app.
 
 %In this thesis, the goal is to develop a client app for an online social network which runs on Android. Using this client app, the user should be able to use the social network with it's whole functionality commonly but additional has the possibility to exchange data with other users using the same app via a P2P network closed for the provider. Regarding the P2P network, nothing new should be created, an existing P2P network should be used for storing the private user data. Main requirement for the online social network is the offering of an API for almost all functionalities to make development easy. For this reason, Twitter is perfectly qualified to be used in the thesis.
 
+This raises the question of how the user's data can be better protected and at the same time the network with its full functionality can be used, so the user does not have to make any compromises. Data exchange between users would have to take place via another channel. In such a hybrid solution, another network would be set up between the users and the data stored decentrally.
+
+This work will examine what such a solution might look like and what difficulties need to be overcome. Which requirements apply to the social network, which to the network between users and which to the client application? How can authenticity be guaranteed in the private network? The results of the research are to be implemented in a prototype and thus the quality of the solutions are validated.
+
+
 \section{Related Work/Background}
 The criticism on how personal data is handled by the large online social networks like Twitter and Facebook is not new. Therefore, there have been some attempts to build networks that focus on privacy. Unfortunately, these attempts were unsuccessful and did not reach critical mass to exist permanently. And although criticism continues and scandals have become public again and again, the majority of users remained loyal to large networks. As a consequence of this circumstance, the protection of personal data with further use of the corresponding networks with all their functions is an interesting topic. One way to better protect privacy is to use a hybrid client app. This hybrid app allows the user to use the network with all its features in a conventional way. But beyond that, it allows the user to share data with other users who are not saved on the servers of the network operator. For this a peer 2 peer network is used and the data is stored decentrally.
 
@@ -67,11 +72,11 @@ Improving privacy and protecting the personal data of Facebook users would be of
 With apps like \textit{Friendly for Facebook} or \textit{Metal} there are alternative Facebook clients in the Google Play Store. Since the official Facebook API may not have been used due to the restrictions, two approaches are conceivable:
 
 \begin{enumerate}
-	\item The website offered for mobile devices (\url{https://m.facebook.com/}) is displayed in a WebView. Thus, the app only serves as a wrapper around the mobile website. However, the different design indicates that the pages are modified by the Android app. This is technically possible by injecting JavaScript code into the page. Disadvantage is that changes on the mobile website lead to the injected JavaScript code suddenly no longer having the desired effect.
-	\item The Facebook website is crawled and the content extracted. The display of the data can therefore be freely designed. The disadvantage of this method is its dependence on the HTML structure of the Facebook web pages. Even small changes to the website could prevent the content from being extracted. Furthermore, requests to the Facebook servers would have to pass through the security precautions on Facebook, for example the presence of any tokens.
+	\item A WebView is used to display the website offered for mobile devices (\url{https://m.facebook.com/}). Thus, the app only serves as a wrapper around the mobile website. However, the different design indicates that the pages are modified by the Android app. This is technically possible by injecting JavaScript code into the page. Disadvantage is that changes on the mobile website lead to the injected JavaScript code suddenly no longer having the desired effect.
+	\item The apps crawl the Facebook website and extract the content. The display of the data can therefore be freely designed. The disadvantage of this method is its dependence on the HTML structure of the Facebook web pages. Even small changes to the website could prevent the content from being extracted. Furthermore, requests to the Facebook servers would have to pass through the security precautions on Facebook, for example the presence of any tokens.
 \end{enumerate}
 
-Due to the limitations of the Facebook Graph API and the unstable and inconsistent workarounds, the idea of using Facebook as social network for a hybrid app was neglected.
+Due to the limitations of the Facebook Graph API and the unstable and inconsistent workarounds, the idea of using Facebook as social network for a hybrid app was neglected for this project.
 
 \subsection{Twitter}
 Besides Facebook, also Twitter was in press in April 2018 because of selling user data to Cambridge Analytica. Indeed, it was only containing data which was publicly posted on Twitter, but nevertheless the data left the social network on way which was not intended by the user.