Independent Project: App Review

Coursework for IM902: Approaches to the Digital

This project was an attempt to instigate a discussion around the notion of ‘permission’ in relation to the network infrastructure and device affordances based on the critical analysis of the Manifest file of the Facebook app and relevant Application Programming Interface (APIs) embedded in its Software Development Kits (SDKs) using R and a subsequent tracker-analysis of the app using Exodus tool. To better understand the Facebook app, I have looked at its manifest file and analyzed it as our critical object of hermeneutics of ‘permission’. This ‘critical code studies’ approach allows us to have an insight how Facebook’s internal infrastructure makes it a giant data extraction medium, often exploiting the users

Outcome:

Submitted Essay: The Case of Facebook App: ‘Can the User Permit?’