The Dark Side of Privacy Nudging – An Experimental Study in the Context of a Digital Work Environment

Privacy nudging is a promising method to get users to disclose less personal information in digital work environments. In this work, we tested two digital privacy nudges: a social and a framing nudge. To empirically measure the effectiveness of the two privacy nudges, we developed an online experiment. We evaluated 223 data sets with the partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM) and a two-factorial Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). The results indicate that privacy nudges negatively influence information disclosure behavior. The privacy framing nudge has a direct and indirect effect, while the privacy social nudge has only an indirect effect on the information disclosure behavior. Individuals exposed to the privacy nudges perceived the stimulus as threat. Importantly, both nudges spark negative feelings. With this research, we are contributing to the discussion of what drives privacy nudge effectiveness and influences information disclosure behavior in digital work environments.