Related papers: Q-A: Towards the Solution of Usability-Security Te…

Protecting personal computers (PCs) from unauthorized access typically relies on password authentication, which is know to suffer from cognitive burden and weak credentials. As many users nowadays carry mobile devices with advanced security…

Cyber attacks has always been of a great concern. Websites and services with poor security layers are the most vulnerable to such cyber attacks. The attackers can easily access sensitive data like credit card details and social security…

Using password based authentication technique, a system maintains the login credentials (username, password) of the users in a password file. Once the password file is compromised, an adversary obtains both the login credentials. With the…

Quantum Physical Unclonable Functions (QPUFs) offer a physically grounded approach to secure authentication, extending the capabilities of classical PUFs. This review covers their theoretical foundations and key implementation challenges -…

Personal devices (e.g. laptops, tablets, and mobile phones) are conventional in daily life and have the ability to store users' private data. The security problems related to these appliances have become a primary concern for both users and…

This review examines how quantum computing and artificial intelligence challenge current cryptographic systems. We analyze the literature to assess the resilience of algorithms against quantum attacks (Shor's and Grover's algorithms) and…

What can humans compute in their heads? We are thinking of a variety of Crypto Protocols, games like Sudoku, Crossword Puzzles, Speed Chess, and so on. The intent of this paper is to apply the ideas and methods of theoretical computer…

The choice of password composition policy to enforce on a password-protected system represents a critical security decision, and has been shown to significantly affect the vulnerability of user-chosen passwords to guessing attacks. In…

For the first time, we report gender bias in people's choice and use of password managers, through a semi-structured interview ($n=18$) and a questionnaire-based survey ($n=200$, conducted `in the wild'). Not only do women and men prefer…

Password security has been compelled to evolve in response to the growing computational capabilities of modern systems. However, this evolution has often resulted in increasingly complex security practices that alienate users, leading to…

Recently, authenticating users with the help of their friends (i.e., trustee-based social authentication) has been shown to be a promising backup authentication mechanism. A user in this system is associated with a few trustees that were…

We present a framework by which websites can coordinate to make it difficult for users to set similar passwords at these websites, in an effort to break the culture of password reuse on the web today. Though the design of such a framework…

Security and usability issues with passwords suggest a need for a new authentication scheme. Several alternatives involve a physical device or token. We investigate one such alternative, Pico: an authentication scheme that utilizes multiple…

Approximately 61% of cyber attacks involve adversaries in possession of valid credentials. Attackers acquire credentials through various means, including phishing, dark web data drops, password reuse, etc. Multi-factor authentication (MFA)…

Strong passwords are fundamental to the security of password-based user authentication systems. In recent years, much effort has been made to evaluate password strength or to generate strong passwords. Unfortunately, the usability or…

In this research, we conduct a user study that compares different computer/system authentication methods. More specifically, we look into comparing regular password authentication with picture authentication. Picture authentication means…

Shoulder surfing is an attack vector widely recognized as a real threat - enough to warrant researchers dedicating a considerable effort toward designing novel authentication methods to be shoulder surfing resistant. Despite a multitude of…

Two-factor authentication (2F) aims to enhance resilience of password-based authentication by requiring users to provide an additional authentication factor, e.g., a code generated by a security token. However, it also introduces…

The purpose of this study was to measure whether participant education, profession, and technical skill level exhibited a relationship with identification of password strength. Participants reviewed 50 passwords and labeled each as weak or…

Leaked passwords from data breaches can pose a serious threat to users if the password is reused elsewhere. With more online services getting breached today, there is still a lack of large-scale quantitative understanding of the risks of…