Towards understanding ATM security: a field study of real world ATM use

  • Authors:
  • Alexander De Luca;Marc Langheinrich;Heinrich Hussmann

  • Affiliations:
  • University of Munich, Munich, Germany;University of Lugano, Lugano, Switzerland;University of Munich, Munich, Germany

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the Sixth Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security
  • Year:
  • 2010

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Abstract

With the increase of automated teller machine (ATM) frauds, new authentication mechanisms are developed to overcome security problems of personal identification numbers (PIN). Those mechanisms are usually judged on speed, security, and memorability in comparison with traditional PIN entry systems. It remains unclear, however, what appropriate values for PIN-based ATM authentication actually are. We conducted a field study and two smaller follow-up studies on real-world ATM use, in order to provide both a better understanding of PIN-based ATM authentication, and on how alternative authentication methods can be compared and evaluated. Our results show that there is a big influence of contextual factors on security and performance in PIN-based ATM use. Such factors include distractions, physical hindrance, trust relationships, and memorability. From these findings, we draw several implications for the design of alternative ATM authentication systems, such as resilience to distraction and social compatibility.