Leveraging the Effects of Cognitive Function on Input Device Analytics to Improve Security - October 2016

Public Audience
Purpose: To highlight project progress. Information is generally at a higher level which is accessible to the interested public. All information contained in the report (regions 1-3) is a Government Deliverable/CDRL.

PI(s):  David L. Roberts, Robert St. Amant
Researchers: Alok Goel, Ignacio X. Dominguez, Jayant Dhawan

HARD PROBLEM(S) ADDRESSED

• Human Behavior - Our work addresses understanding human behavior through observations of input device usage. The basic principles we are developing will enable new avenues for characterizing risk and identifying malicious (or accidental) uses of systems that lead to security problems. The ultimate goal of our work is the development of a novel class of security proofs that we call "Human Subtlety Proofs" (HSPs). HSPs combine the unobtrusiveness of Human Observational Proofs with the interactivity of Human Interactive Proofs, which hopefully will lead to more secure interactions.

PUBLICATIONS

• Ignacio X. Domínguez, Prairie Rose Goodwin, David L. Roberts, and Robert St. Amant. Human Subtlety Proofs: Using Computer Games to Model Cognitive Processes for Cybersecurity. International Journal Of Human–Computer Interaction. Online. 2016.

• Ignacio X. Domínguez, Jayant Dhawan, Robert St. Amant and David L. Roberts. Exploring the Effects of Different Text Stimuli on Typing Behavior. Proceedings of the 2016 International Conference on Cognitive Modeling (ICCM 2016). State College, PA, USA. 2016.

• Ignacio X. Domínguez, Jayant Dhawan, Robert St. Amant and David L. Roberts. JIVUI: JavaScript Interface for Visualization of User Interaction. Proceedings of the 2016 International Conference on Cognitive Modeling (ICCM 2016). State College, PA, USA. 2016.

• Robert St. Amant and David L. Roberts. Natural Interaction for Bot Detection. IEEE Internet Computing ( Volume: 20, Issue: 4, July-Aug. 2016 ). 

ACCOMPLISHMENT HIGHLIGHTS

• Our tool for visualizing cognitive phenomena during user interface interaction has been used extensively to hone in on evidence of cognition's effects on input device usage. The results have provided key metrics for identifying changes in cognition that reflect changes in task completion strategies that may be reflective of insecure behavior by users. 

• We have begun development of a new framework for making interface-level changes during task-based interaction on the linux command line. This new framework is the basis for the implementation of the first Human Subtlety Proofs. The framework runs in a web browser and connects to a standard linux machine, and it will facilitate the evaluation of these proofs.