ISCA SIG “Security and Privacy in Speech Communication” 

Speech  is a particularly sensitive signal: it contains not only our intentional communication but also implicit information, for example about our gender, age, education, culture, emotions, state of health and attitudes. Such information can be analyzed from speech, for our safety and convenience but can also be exploited by adversaries. It is our responsibility, as researchers and scientists in the speech sciences, to develop our understanding of privacy and security, as well as to design methods that defend the security and privacy of users and society.

The ISCA special interest group “Security and Privacy in Speech Communication” (SIG SPSC) was founded in 2019, to address all such aspects of security and privacy which are connected to the speech sciences. It is inherently an interdisciplinary venue. We are interested in, for example, how machine learning methods can provide privacy features, how private information like identity, health and emotions can be extracted or suppressed from speech, how legal systems like the GDPR, the CCPA, or the APPI address privacy in the context of speech, how voice user interfaces should be designed for security and privacy, and how features of privacy are perceived by users. Our regular activities include monthly webinars and a café journal club. Our first symposium was held in November 2021. If you are interested, join us at https://www.spsc-sig.org/.

Call for volunteers

As a satellite event for Interspeech 2022 in Incheon, Korea, we are organizing the second SPSC Symposium. We are now looking for volunteers to join the organizing committee, for all roles, big and small. We especially encourage our colleagues in Asia to provide us with the local knowledge needed. Please, express your interest to volunteer by sending an email to symposium2022@lists.spsc-sig.org.

https://www.spsc-sig.org/symposium 

Prof. Tom Backström

Aalto University

Finland