• Media type: Doctoral Thesis; E-Book; Electronic Thesis; Text
  • Title: Human Factors in Secure Software Development
  • Contributor: Acar, Yasemin [Author]
  • imprint: Philipps-Universität Marburg, 2021
  • Language: English
  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.17192/z2021.0231
  • Keywords: human factors in security ; sichere Softwareentwicklung ; HCI ; security ; usable security ; Experiment ; Mathematics ; human factors ; Faktor Mensch ; Privatsphäre ; benutzbare IT-Sicherheit ; software development ; Umfrage ; Softwareentwicklung ; Mathematik ; human factors in secure software development ; privacy ; Sicherheit
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  • Description: While security research has made significant progress in the development of theoretically secure methods, software and algorithms, software still comes with many possible exploits, many of those using the human factor. The human factor is often called ``the weakest link'' in software security. To solve this, human factors research in security and privacy focus on the users of technology and consider their security needs. The research then asks how technology can serve users while minimizing risks and empowering them to retain control over their own data. However, these concepts have to be implemented by developers whose security errors may proliferate to all of their software's users. For example, software that stores data in an insecure way, does not secure network traffic correctly, or otherwise fails to adhere to secure programming best practices puts all of the software's users at risk. It is therefore critical that software developers implement security correctly. However, in addition to security rarely being a primary concern while producing software, developers may also not have extensive awareness, knowledge, training or experience in secure development. A lack of focus on usability in libraries, documentation, and tools that they have to use for security-critical components may exacerbate the problem by blowing up the investment of time and effort needed to "get security right". This dissertation's focus is how to support developers throughout the process of implementing software securely. This research aims to understand developers' use of resources, their mindsets as they develop, and how their background impacts code security outcomes. Qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods were employed online and in the laboratory, and large scale datasets were analyzed to conduct this research. This research found that the information sources developers use can contribute to code (in)security: copying and pasting code from online forums leads to achieving functional code quickly compared to using official ...
  • Access State: Open Access