This course teaches you the design and evaluation of usable, secure and privacy aware systems.

3 hours per week.

None

None

Examination 60%, Coursework 40%

It is the default expectation that all courses will offer opportunities for reassessment or deferred assessment. Where it is not possible to offer this in some assessment components, the grade achieved at the first attempt will be counted towards the final course grade, and any exceptions for this course are described below.

[No exceptions]

This course aims to:

Foster an appreciation of the vital role played by human factors in securing systems;

Explain and allow students to appreciate the multiple dimensions of the core principles of privacy, authentication, biometrics, risk communication, and the importance of security systems interface usability.

By the end of the course students will be able to:

1. Explain primary themes and challenges of human centred security;

2. Examine a given context and design an appropriate security solution and be able to justify your choices;

3. Identify usability, privacy or security issues in a given system, and make recommendations about how to improve it;

4. Communicate risks to non-expert users in an understandable way;

5. Identify causative effects of particular human behaviours in a security setting, explain how these can be influenced;

6. Demonstrate an understanding of common threats, and be able to critique and design solutions to mitigate against them;

7. Design and analyse the results of user studies to evaluate the usability and security of computing systems;

8. Compare and contrast approaches to establishing and maintaining privacy;

9. Demonstrate an understanding of social engineering and its significance.