Development of students’ security and privacy habits scale

Abstract

The cyber space offers many opportunities to general public but it has its dark side in terms of cyber crimes. Apart from technical security, the human factor plays an important role in safe guarding the security and privacy of systems. The end users especially students need to be aware of protective measures they can adopt to safe guard themselves through security awareness and trainings. The awareness programs should be comprehensive and be tailored according to the security and privacy awareness of the individuals. Therefore, the target individuals should be assessed in terms of their security and privacy habits and practices. The previous endeavors in this respect make use of questionnaire instruments that are specific to a particular type of individuals such as employees of an organizations or tap onto use of a specific device. This study presents development of an instrument that gauges the security and privacy habits/practices of end users specifically students.