Hi, I’m Maritza. I care about building things that allow people to enjoy technological advancements without having to jump through unreasonable hoops to do it safely.
I'm an expert on human-centered security and privacy, and I'm the inaugural director of a new center for data science, AI, and society at the University of San Diego. Through my work I shape how organizations design and deploy data systems. My industry experience includes working as a user experience researcher on identity, security, and privacy at Google, and as a technical privacy manager at Facebook. In 2018, I co-created a usable privacy and security course for UC Berkeley's Master of Information and Cybersecurity program. I completed my PhD at Columbia University and wrote my dissertation on end-user access control, including researching whether people can correctly manage their Facebook privacy settings. In a few words, it’s complicated.If you're curious to see more check out my publications or Data Curious, a new project I'm contributing that aims to stoke your curiosity about how data is collected and used in our world.
Interests
- Human factors
- Privacy
- Security
Education
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PhD in Computer Science, 2012
Columbia University
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MS in Computer Science, 2008
Columbia University
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BA in Computer Science, 2005
University of San Diego
Select Publications
Improving Verifiability in AI Development
While a growing number of organizations have articulated ethics principles to guide their AI development process, it can be difficult for those outside of an organization to verify whether the organization’s AI systems reflect those principles in practice. This report grapples with approaches to mitigate these concerns.
What Can’t Data Be Used For? Privacy Expectations about Smart TVs in the U.S.
Smart TVs have rapidly become the most common smart appliance in typical households. We surveyed 591 U.S. Internet users about their current understanding and expectations about how smart TVs collect and use data. We found a wide range of assumptions and opinions among our respondents, and a good deal of uncertainty about what’s collected and how it is used.
A study of privacy settings errors in an online social network
Access control policies are notoriously difficult to configure correctly, even people who are professionally trained system administrators experience difficulty with the task. With the increasing popularity of online social networks (OSN) users of all levels are sharing an unprecedented amount of personal information on the Internet. We present the results of a study that measures sharing intentions to identify potential violations in users' real Facebook privacy settings. Our results indicate a serious mismatch between intentions and reality: every one of the 65 participants in our study had at least one confirmed sharing violation. In other words, OSN users' are unable to correctly manage their privacy settings. Furthermore, a majority of users cannot or will not fix such errors.
