Balancing The Perception of Cheating Detection, Privacy and Fairness: A Mixed-Methods Study of Visual Data Obfuscation in Remote Proctoring

Remote proctoring technology, a cheating-preventive measure, often raises privacy and fairness concerns that may affect test-takers' experiences and the validity of test results. Our study explores how selectively obfuscating information in video recordings can protect test-takers' privacy while ensuring effective and fair cheating detection. Interviews with experts (N=9) identified four key video regions indicative of potential cheating behaviors: the test-taker's face, body, background and the presence of individuals in the background. Experts recommended specific obfuscation methods for each region based on privacy significance and cheating behavior frequency, ranging from conventional blurring to advanced methods like replacement with deepfake, 3D avatars and silhouetting. We then conducted a vignette experiment with potential test-takers (N=259, non-experts) to evaluate their perceptions of cheating detection, visual privacy and fairness, using descriptions and examples of still images for each expert-recommended combination of video regions and obfuscation methods. Our results indicate that the effectiveness of obfuscation methods varies by region. Tailoring remote proctoring with region-specific advanced obfuscation methods can improve the perceptions of privacy and fairness compared to the conventional methods, though it may decrease perceived information sufficiency for detecting cheating. However, non-experts preferred conventional blurring for videos they were more willing to share, highlighting a gap between the perceived effectiveness of the advanced obfuscation methods and their practical acceptance. This study contributes to the field of user-centered privacy by suggesting promising directions to address current remote proctoring challenges and guiding future research.