Purpose The end-user has frequently been identified as the weakest link; however, motivated by the fact that different users react differently to the same stimuli, identifying the reasons behind variations in security behavior and why certain users could be “at risk” more than others is a step toward protecting and defending users against security attacks. This paper aims to explore the effect of personality trait variations (through the Big Five Inventory [BFI]) on users’ risk level of their intended security behaviors. In addition, age, gender, service usage and information technology (IT) proficiency are analyzed to identify what role and impact they have on behavior. Design/methodology/approach The authors developed a quantitative-oriented survey that was implemented online. The bi-variate Pearson two-tailed correlation was used to analyze survey responses. Findings The results obtained by analyzing 538 survey responses suggest that personality traits do play a significant role in affecting users’ security behavior risk levels. Furthermore, the results suggest that BFI score of a trait has a significant effect as users’ online personality is linked to their offline personality, especially in the conscientiousness personality trait. Additionally, this effect was stronger when personality was correlated with the factors of IT proficiency, gender, age and online activity. Originality/value The contributions of this paper are two-fold. First, with the aid of a large population sample, end-users’ security practice is assessed from multiple domains, and relationships were found between end-users’ risk-taking behavior and nine user-centric factors. Second, based upon these findings, the predictive ability for these user-centric factors were evaluated to determine the level of risk a user is subject to from an individual behavior perspective. Of 28 behaviors, 11 were found to have a 60 per cent or greater predictive ability, with the highest classification of 92 per cent for several behaviors. This provides a basis for organizations to use behavioral intent alongside personality traits and demographics to understand and, therefore, manage the human aspects of risk.
The risk of sensitive information disclosure and modification through the use of online services has increased considerably and may result in significant damage. As the management and assessment of such risks is a well-known discipline for organizations, it is a challenge for users from the general public. Users have difficulties in using, understanding and reacting to security-related threats. Moreover, users only try to protect themselves from risks salient to them. Motivated by the lack of risk assessment solutions and limited impact of awareness programs tailored for users of the general public, this paper aims to develop a structured approach to help in protecting users from threats and vulnerabilities and, thus, reducing the overall information security risks. By focusing on the user and that different users react differently to the same stimuli, the authors developed a user-centric risk assessment and response framework that assesses and communicates risk on both user and system level in an individualized, timely and continuous way. Three risk assessment models were proposed that depend on user-centric and behavior-related factors when calculating risk. This framework was evaluated using a scenario-based simulation of a number of users and results analyzed. The analysis demonstrated the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed approach. Encouragingly, this analysis provided an indication that risk can be assessed differently for the same behavior based upon a number of user-centric and behavioralrelated factors resulting in an individualized granular risk score/level. This granular risk assessment, provided a more insightful evaluation of both risk and response. The analysis of results was also useful in demonstrating how risk is not the same for all users and how the proposed model is effective in adapting to differences between users offering a novel approach to assessing information security risks.
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