Computing recommendations to trust

Abstract

In a technology-intensive world humans are facing new problems stemming from the introduction of machine-intensive communication. The natural human ability to asses, accumulate and evaluate trust in other humans through direct interpersonal communications is significantly impaired when humans interact with systems alone. The development of applications that rely on trust, like electronic commerce, can be significantly affected by this fact unless humans can be better advised on trust. This paper proposes a simple trust model used by the Intimate Trust Advisor (ITA), the conceptual device, to evaluate the recommendation to trust in the immediate technical environment. The model of trust discussed in this paper explores relationship between trust and complexity. © Springer-Verlag 2004.