Privacy as a Lifestyle: Empowering assistive technologies for people with disabilities, challenges and future directions

Abstract

Between the changing Industry 4.0 landscape and the rise of Industry 5.0, where human intelligence and intelligent machines work together, vast amounts of privacy-sensitive data are generated, processed, and exchanged, making them attractive targets of various attacks. Hence, privacy protection has become a major human concern. Due to its importance, this paper investigates the state-of-the-art research efforts directed toward privacy preservation. Firstly, this paper examines the main privacy requirements and identifies the key privacy-related threats and attacks for systems integrating blockchain and AI. Secondly, we study Blockchain-based privacy preservation solutions, and we devise a taxonomy to classify them based on privacy of data and privacy of network. Thirdly, AI-based privacy-preserving methods are discussed and categorized into privacy-preserving data, privacy-preserving model, and privacy-preserving service. Moreover, this paper adds value by analyzing the impact of privacy from technical aspects, human and social-economic aspects, and ethical and legal considerations. Additionally, it sheds light on the role of privacy as a lifestyle, which is crucial not only in mainstream sectors but also for people with disabilities who depend on technological advancements and privacy safeguards for their empowerment. The paper concludes by addressing open challenges in privacy preservation, paving the way for future research directions vital for fostering a privacy-centric evolution in the dynamic Industry 4.0 and beyond.

Keywords

• Artificial intelligence, blockchain
• Data privacy
• Industry 5.0
• People with disabilities
• Privacy-preserving