CICI: USCC: Supporting Scientists as End-Users in Managing Security and Privacy

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Scientific users are experts in their chosen fields, but may not be experts in computing in general or in security and privacy specifically.This research investigates scientific end-users, defined broadly, as a specialized user group in need of specific, targeted support for managing security and privacy of computing systems during their scientific endeavors. The goal of this work is to evaluate and improve end-user tools and processes for scientists managing security and privacy for their labs, by answering the following research questions: How do scientists think about security and privacy for their computing and data resources? What tools do scientists regularly use, and how do they enable or inhibit good security and privacy practices? And, how can the current situation be improved through better guidance and new standards, tools, or processes? This project enables improvements in security and privacy tools and processes for scientific workflows and develops workshops and guidance documents specifically targeted at scientists.This project uses surveys, interviews, document review, cognitive walkthroughs, and ethnographic embedding to investigate how scientists currently learn about and execute security- and privacy-relevant behaviors for their equipment and data. These studies are designed to gain insight into current tools and practices, as well as organizational incentives and barriers that affect security and privacy outcomes, in order to provide actionable improvements.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.