The importance of social identity on password formulations

• Published in: Personal and ubiquitous computing 2021-10, Vol.25 (5), p.813-827
• Main Authors: Grobler, Marthie, Chamikara, M. A. P., Abbott, Jacob, Jeong, Jongkil Jay, Nepal, Surya, Paris, Cecile
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Computer Science; Context; Cybersecurity; Mobile Computing; Original Article; Passwords; Personal Computing; Social identity; Trends; User Interfaces and Human Computer Interaction
• ISSN: 1617-4909; 1617-4917
• DOI: 10.1007/s00779-020-01477-1

Passwords are regarded as the most common authentication mechanism used by Web-based services, despite large-scale attacks and data breaches regularly exploiting password-associated vulnerabilities. We investigate the trends behind password formulation in an exploratory study to postulate that social identity and language play a major role in users’ general attitude toward formulating passwords. For this, we conduct a descriptive analysis of two publicly available datasets containing real username and password combinations to determine whether these socio-cultural factors play a formative role in how users formulate their passwords across countries. The preliminary results confirm that both these elements contribute to increased vulnerabilities associated with passwords. The novelty of our work lies in the exploratory investigation of identifiable trends in password formulation with regard to social context (language and identity influences) and technical context (particularly password structure). The impact of our study is a move toward a better understanding of human behavior in the context of password formulation specifically, to enable the future crafting of more targeted cybersecurity interventions that would lead to positive online behavioral change.