Privacy and Public Logo

In this paper we study the influence of an institutional logo (CNIL) on individuals’ disclosure of personal data. We draw on a field experiment carried out in the context of a university investigation, and compare the responses of a treatment group (with a logo) to those of a control group (without a logo). We show that the influence of the logo depends on the perceived legitimacy of the questions, including psychological questions which are a priori less legitimate in a university setting. These results suggest that the choice of privacy may be affected by the presence of a public logo, which acts as a nudge.