Privacy and Security in Technology-Enhanced Environments: Exploring Users’ Knowledge about Technological Processes of Diverse User Groups

This article reports on two user studies exploring the knowledge of end users about technical processes of technology-enhanced home environments, which are often assumed to play an important role for attitudes such as privacy and security. In the first study (n=12 participants between 19-71 years of age), we analyzed user knowledge about technical processes using the teach-back methodology. In the second study, we additionally applied new developed questionnaires and analyzed participants’ data (n=24 participants between 19-76 years of age) regarding relations of user factors, users’ knowledge about technical processes and attitudes such as privacy and security of technology-enhanced environments. In contrast to existing assumptions, the results showed that general structural knowledge about technical processes was not related with attitudes such as privacy and security. Additionally, we found that most participants had only relatively superficial knowledge about technical processes, which was further influenced by age and technology experience.