Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Home users are particularly vulnerable to information security threats as they must make decisions about how to protect themselves, often with little knowledge of the technology. Furthermore, information for home users tends to focus...

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Main Authors: McGill, T., Thompson, Nik
Format: Journal Article
Published: Brill 2017
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/55639
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author McGill, T.
Thompson, Nik
author_facet McGill, T.
Thompson, Nik
author_sort McGill, T.
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Home users are particularly vulnerable to information security threats as they must make decisions about how to protect themselves, often with little knowledge of the technology. Furthermore, information for home users tends to focus on the traditional PC and may downplay threats faced on mobile devices, transforming well-known and old risks into new challenges for information security. To address the need for more behavioural information security research that focusses on mobile devices, this paper reports on the first large-scale study comparing security perceptions and behaviours on home computer and mobile devices. Data from 629 users revealed that in addition to differences in information security behaviour, the following security-related perceptions all differ significantly between home computer and mobile device use: perceived severity, security self-efficacy, response efficacy, response cost, descriptive norm, psychological ownership and intention to perform security behaviours. In each case, the direction of the difference was such that mobile devices were more likely to be at risk than a home computer. The practical implications of these differences are discussed.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-556392017-09-13T16:11:24Z Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use McGill, T. Thompson, Nik © 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group Home users are particularly vulnerable to information security threats as they must make decisions about how to protect themselves, often with little knowledge of the technology. Furthermore, information for home users tends to focus on the traditional PC and may downplay threats faced on mobile devices, transforming well-known and old risks into new challenges for information security. To address the need for more behavioural information security research that focusses on mobile devices, this paper reports on the first large-scale study comparing security perceptions and behaviours on home computer and mobile devices. Data from 629 users revealed that in addition to differences in information security behaviour, the following security-related perceptions all differ significantly between home computer and mobile device use: perceived severity, security self-efficacy, response efficacy, response cost, descriptive norm, psychological ownership and intention to perform security behaviours. In each case, the direction of the difference was such that mobile devices were more likely to be at risk than a home computer. The practical implications of these differences are discussed. 2017 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/55639 10.1080/0144929X.2017.1352028 Brill restricted
spellingShingle McGill, T.
Thompson, Nik
Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title_full Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title_fullStr Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title_full_unstemmed Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title_short Old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
title_sort old risks, new challenges: exploring differences in security between home computer and mobile device use
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/55639