Usable security

The increased availability of information and services has led to the affirmation of the Internet involvement of a large segment of the population. This implied a paradigm shift for computer security: users becomes less skilled and security aware, requiring easier interface to communicate with “the machine” and more specific and comprehensible security measures.This two aspects, which are by itself complex and challenging, have significant reciprocal influence. In practice, has been proven very intriguing to study and propose effective trade-offs among them. This chapter focus on these aspects, by analyzing the goals and state of the art of usability and security to understand where and how they might be effectively “aligned”.