We’ve all used an app or website and become annoyed by its “extreme” security measures, whether its password complex conditions, tricky captchas, or phone number verification.
Yet, as you know, there is a good reason all these exist. And more often than not, developers struggle to find the right balance between good user experience and proper user security.
In this article, we’ll go over User Experience Design and User Security concepts. Furthermore, we'll focus on ensuring one doesn’t sabotage the other. Let’s go!
What is User Experience?
As the name hints, User Experience UX revolves around a user’s journey while using a product, such as how someone reacts when interacting with a website or mobile app.
However, UX does not only involve the product itself; aspects such as customer support and product-related sites are also under consideration.
Moreover, there are many facets to User Experience Design, such as usability, visual design, and accessibility.
Why is User Experience Important?
Good User Experience revolves around making users happy, so UX must focus on customer satisfaction to ensure higher conversion and retention rates while fostering brand loyalty.
For companies, good UX reduces development, bug-fixing, and marketing costs. Investing in researching your target before developing your product helps deliver a better product with a higher return on your investment.
In short, User Experience affects your brand’s reputation, customer loyalty, and sales, which are essential aspects if you want your product to succeed.
UX Design Best Practices
According to Peter Morville's User Experience Honeycomb, there are seven UX Design principles.
1. Useful: A product must fulfill a purpose or a need.
2. Usable: Your product should be simple and easy to use.
3. Findable: Users need to be able to perform tasks when using your product.
4. Believable: Your target audience needs to be able to trust your product.
5. Desirable: Your product's visual aesthetics should appeal to the target user.
6. Accessible: You should consider all users' needs when designing your product.
7. Valuable: All aspects above must deliver value to the product's users.
What is Cyber Security?
Cyber Security entails different methods, technologies, and processes to protect systems, networks, and programs from cyber attacks or unauthorized access.
Furthermore, Cyber Security prevents unauthorized actions such as modifications, access, and deletions based on three security pillars: confidentiality, integrity, and data availability.
Why Pay Attention To Cyber Security?
We all rely on computer systems to store data and perform daily transactions, and it’s well-known that cyber-attacks have a plethora of unwanted consequences.
For instance, the loss of essential data to identify theft and electrical blackouts can lead to considerable economic costs and even affect individuals or entire cities and countries!
User Security in Cyber Security
Also known as end-user security and user-level security, User Security is the aspect of Cyber Security focused on protecting users’ data and online activity. Some edges included in User Security are biometric authentication and multi-factor authentication.
User Security vs User Experience
Sometimes it feels like user security comes at the detriment of User Experience. As a matter of fact, frustration with security-based processes can lead to many users abandoning a digital product or service.
However, it's all about finding the right balance while thinking of ways to cut the impact of User Security measures on the UX. Some experts, like Jared Spool, even believe that if a product is not usable, it isn’t secure.
Before capitalizing on User Experience to make User Security less disruptive, let’s look at the popular User Security measures that can hinder User Experience:
1. CAPTCHAs: CAPTCHA stands for Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart, and it requires users to enter one or more words or identify objects in a group of photos to prove they are human.
Yet, while these help reduce automated bot attacks, they also come at the expense of User Experience. Not only do you have to stop and think to get through the CAPTCHA, but mistakes that make you have to re-do the process are increasingly annoying and can lead to product abandonment.
2. Obfuscation: You have most likely encountered a message of “the username or password is incorrect” when making a typo. And most likely, you became annoyed by not knowing where you made that typo, specifically if you don’t log into this product or service regularly or don't remember its details. Yet, this message is key in preventing attackers from compiling valid usernames to target.
3. Automatic Log Out: Have you ever left your device for a few minutes to return and find that your session has expired? This is another security measure, and while it prevents unauthorized access, it may come at the cost of a good User Experience.
4. Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA): Two-factor or multi-factor authentication may feel overkill, but it's proven to block most or all automated attacks. For instance, bulk phishing attacks and two-thirds of targeted attacks. It does, however, interrupt user flow.
5. Password Requirements: Password requirements and the methods to deem a password as strong hare becoming more complex. You may have to include at least eight characters, numbers, and symbols, or use upper and lowercase letters. Since these are often hard to remember, and you are prone to typing errors, this process can also hinder UX.
Real-Life Examples of User Security
As you can see, some User Security measures can go against some of the UX principles we saw earlier, such as usability and credibility.
How does one manage this? Well, as we’ll see, there are ways to prevent this from happening. Here are two examples of how these problems have been solved.
Biometrics for User Security
We all used a four or six-digit code to unlock our phones, with many people using easy passwords like “1234” or “000000,” making them easier to remember. This tactic to guarantee remembering the code was also a considerable security risk.
Today, we have biometric authentication, so we can securely unlock our phones with a touch of our thumb. There is also facial recognition, voice recognition, and eye-based authentication.
Find my iPhone for User Security
Another great example is Apple’s “Find my iPhone” feature. If you have an Android phone, you will need to access the Android Device Manager to find your phone.
But, if you aren't already signed in on your computer and have two-factor authentication (as you should), it will be rather tricky to log in.
Google will ask you to enter the code sent to your phone to verify it’s the account you are trying to access. As you can imagine, if you lose your phone, this is rather impossible.
Apple, however, won’t force you to prove that you are you to help you find your phone. If you get worried about security, don’t stress! You can only access the “Find my iPhone” page.
This means others can’t use this as a trick to access your data. Apple also sends you a notification to let you know someone is trying to access your account.
Conclusion
Coordinating User Experience Design and User Security can be challenging, yet it is far from impossible! Thinking about the user’s needs always pays off. We hope to give you a clear idea of how to make UX and User Security work for you—and your users, of course!
