Human Factors Impacting the Security Actions of Help Recipients

Some users (“Help recipients”) delegate necessary security actions to their family, friends, or others close to them. It is important to be able to take appropriate defensive actions against security threats by themselves when help is not available from neighbors (“Helpers”). In this paper, we interviewed 9 users who used to be Help recipients, but who have now started to take security actions by themselves. We investigated the reason why Help recipients delegated their security actions to Helpers and the human factors that have an impact when one takes security actions by oneself. As a result, Help recipients take their own security actions when they try new hobbies or feel a sense of ownership. Based on these findings, we classify Help recipients into four groups and propose an optimized system that shows security action lists according to user situation. These findings are useful when providing appropriate intervention for Help recipients.