EWADA Research Internship: Building Usable Data Control Applications

EWADA Research Internship: Building Usable Data Control Applications

The Human Centred Computing (HCC) Research Group (http://hcc.cs.ox.ac.uk) in Oxford’s Computer Science Department is very excited to announce 3 summer internships in 2024!!!

Please come to join us if you want to create an AUTONOMOUS Web with a group of world-leading computer scientists!

Detailed job description

You will be working as part of the Oxford Martin School programme EWADA (Ethical Web and Data Infrastructure in the Age of AI) [1]. Data driven algorithms are positively changing every aspect of our lives. However, from simple data aggregation algorithms for drawing collective insights to more advanced machine learning algorithms, all involve computations that are currently performed using centralised access to the users' data. This not only causes severe transparency and accountability challenges but also to individuals’ data autonomy.

During the internship, you will be responsible for developing new Web applications that enable web users to take back the control of their personal online data and decide how an application may make use of their data in an ethical and privacy-preserving way. Specifically, you will use the Solid (Social Linked Data) architecture [2], which is a standards-based approach that provides practical solutions to web decentralisation and empowers people to take back control of their data and regain their self autonomy. This post will focus on empowering users with the ability to express and understand their Data Terms of Use (DToU) policies [3] and analyse (mis-)alignments between their DToU expectations through automated reasoning.

Background of the project
EWADA is an ambitious 3-year programme that aims to reform the concentration of power on the Web by developing and deploying new forms of technical and legal infrastructure.The project is led by Prof Sir Nigel Shadbolt and Prof Sir Tim Berner-Lee and aims to investigate novel re-decentralisation architectures and develop privacy-preserving AI methods to re-establish citizens’ self-autonomy on the Web.

Selection criteria
You are expected to have experience with full-stack web development and be interested and willing to learn about EWADA research and Solid ecosystems (in Javascript or Python). Moreover, you will need to be able to work well with others, as these roles will be highly collaborative.

Essential
● Substantial experience or capability of developing Web-based applications
● Expertise with Web technologies including HTML/CSS/JavaScript
● Sufficient understanding of client-server architecture and/or distributed systems
● The ability to communicate information clearly, including technical content
● The ability and desire to work with research staff to elicit information about how information should be organised
● The ability and desire to learn about Solid-related technologies, to quickly acquire domain expertise needed for effectively developing new (Web) applications
● The ability to effectively manage time to complete projects efficiently
● The ability to work independently and think creativelyDesirable
● Sufficient understanding of underlying Web protocols, and/or
● Knowledge of RDF and/or Linked-Data technologies
● Expertise with Linux-based Operating Systems
● Substantial experience with version management tools like git
● Graphic and interaction design experience and expertise
● Experience with online prototyping tools
● Knowledge of deploying NLP and/or LLM tools

Application
The post is expected to be full-time (36.5 hours) for 12 weeks, starting mid-July 2024 and ending in early October 2024, £13.93 - £15.60 (Grade 3.8 - 4.7) per hour, depending on experience. If you are a student holding a Tier 4 visa, then you are permitted to work full-time for 8 weeks, plus 4 weeks part-time (max 20 hrs per week).

The post does not have to be based in Oxford but will be subject to the right to work in the UK. We CANNOT sponsor visa applications due to the short duration of the project.

Applications should be submitted to the Human Resources Department at hr@cs.ox.ac.uk with a resume or CV. A short paragraph on your background, interests and motivation to apply will be helpful.

The subject of the email should be: “Internship Application for EWADA Research Internship: Building Usable Data Control Applications”.

The closing date for applications is noon on Friday 14th June 2024. Candidates will be shortlisted and invited for an interview in late June.
[1] https://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/ethical-web-and-data-architectures/
[2] https://solidproject.org
[3] Zhao R and Zhao J. Perennial semantic data terms of use for decentralized web. In WWW'2024.