Usable Security and Privacy. 3 credits, 3 contact hours

Catalog description

Prerequisites: IT 230 or CS 351 or IS 247 . Cybersecurity and privacy incidents are often blamed on people’s choices, but what led to these decisions? If we understand the reasons for these failures and how the systems themselves contributed to them, we can create better technologies that help improve people’s security and privacy. In this course, we will study how security and privacy decisions are made in the real world, how incomplete or faulty assumptions may cause mistakes to be made, and what it takes to design and develop systems that overcome these issues. The course will synthesize and present important research in security, privacy, and human-computer interaction. In addition, students will learn and practice techniques, which are commonly used by user experience researchers, that will help them independently evaluate the usability of systems.