Evaluating image filtering based techniques in media space applications

Media space applications that promote informal awareness in an organization confront an inevitable paradox: the shared video connections between offices and rooms that promote informal awareness also can rob individuals of privacy. An important open problem in this area is how to foster awareness of colleagues while minimizing the accompanying loss of privacy. One proposal put forward is to filter the communicated video streams rather than broadcasting clear video. Such a scheme may facilitate awareness while helping to alleviate some aspects of the privacy loss. In this article, we describe several image filtering techniques that provide awareness in informal group communication applications while blurring the details of an individual’s activities, thus potentially preserving more privacy. We describe studies to quantitatively and qualitatively assess the degrees of awareness and accuracy that these filtering techniques provide.