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| Graduate Seminar
Colloquia |
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| Date
and Time: |
Wednesday, November 4th, 2009
at
5:30PM
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| Location: |
Thornton Hall 331 |
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Presenter(s): |
Dr. Edward Lank (University of Waterloo)
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| Subject: |
Naïve Security in a Wi-Fi World
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Abstract: |
Despite nearly ubiquitous access to wireless networks, many users still engage in risky behaviors,
make bad choices, or are indifferent to the concerns that security and privacy researchers work
diligently to address. At present, research on user attitudes toward security and privacy on public
wireless networks is rare. This paper explores wireless security and privacy by interpreting users'
current actions and analyzing users' reluctance to change. Through interviews and concrete
demonstrations of vulnerability, we show that users currently make irrational choices about security
based on mistaken analogy to their experiences in the physical world. We show that, despite
awareness of vulnerabilities, users remain ingenuous; that is, they fail to develop a realistic view
of risk. Finally, we observe that users practice a form of naïve security, where superficial
misunderstandings of risk and vulnerability pose significant challenges to the design of security
tools. We argue that tools need to use this understanding of naïve security to better inform
user behavior in our WiFi world. |
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Dr. Edward Lank is an Assistant Professor in the David R. Cheriton School of
Computer Science at the University of Waterloo. His research is in the area of Human-Computer
Interaction (HCI), including applications of tablet computing, the study of motion kinematics in
interfaces, and the design of pervasive computing applications. Prior to joining the faculty at
Waterloo, Dr. Lank was an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at San Francisco State University,
was a research intern at the Palo Alto Research Center in the Perceptual Document Analysis Area; was
Chief Technical Officer of MediaShell Corporation, a Queen's University research start-up; and was
an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Computing and Information Science at Queen's University.
He received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada in
2001 under the supervision of Dr. Dorothea Blostein. He also holds a Bachelor's Degree in Physics
with a Minor in Computer Science from the University of Prince Edward Island.
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