Click passwords under investigation

Abstract

The paper explores one of the graphical authentication techniques as the possible solution to the most important problems of traditional passwords. The aim of this work is to bring together the technical (cryptological) and non-technical (psychological) awareness into the research on passwords (click passwords in this case). Security issues of any authentication mechanism (relying on knowledge) should not be considered without analysis of the human factor - since the users' human nature was identified as a source of major weaknesses of conventional authentication. The paper deals with techniques which reduce password space and make passwords guesses feasible. Four types of pictures areas (of graphical interfaces) were investigated in order to bring to light common vulnerabilities -three of them were identified as types, which the graphical keypads should avoid. Statistics exposing strong tendentiousness in click passwords selection were presented as well. Furthermore, the paper presents a discussion on several issues of title authentication with regard to traditional passwords and other graphical techniques. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.