The week's pick
Reseach Article
Security Workers are Users Too: A Novel Framework for Usability
| International Journal of Computer Applications |
| Foundation of Computer Science (FCS), NY, USA |
| Volume 184 - Number 47 |
| Year of Publication: 2023 |
| Authors: Mrunmayee Khare, Rajvardhan Oak |
10.5120/ijca2023922581
|
Mrunmayee Khare, Rajvardhan Oak . Security Workers are Users Too: A Novel Framework for Usability. International Journal of Computer Applications. 184, 47 ( Feb 2023), 1-4. DOI=10.5120/ijca2023922581
Abstract
Security workers are critical components of the security lifecycle. Be it researchers, engineers, content moderators, lawyers, privacy champions, all of them play an important role in keeping users and data safe. Most qualitative research in security-related areas has been user-centric; it has focused on identifying pain points and concerns for end users. Usability and perspectives of security workers have been largely ignored. In this paper, we provide a framework that can be used for worker-centric usability studies. Recognizing that security is a multi-faceted issue (ranging from highly technical aspects like cryptography to human-centric aspects like hate speech), we first develop a taxonomy for security workers based on where they lie on this spectrum and classify them into four levels. Because security as an end-to-end task requires coordination across all levels of workers, simply studying or interviewing workers from one level may produce biased results, and lead researchers to suggest solutions that are not practically possible. In order to address this, we present a novel methodology that can be used for effective qualitative research that can help in identifying not only pain points, but also produce actionable insights across multiple levels of security workers.
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