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Tale of two browsers: Understanding users’ web browser choices in south Korea

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

Abstract

Internet users in South Korea seem to have clearly different web browser choices and usage patterns compared to the rest of the world, heavily using Internet Explorer (IE) or multiple browsers. Our work is primarily motivated to investigate the reasons for such differences in web browser usage, relating with the use of government mandated security technology, digital certificate. We conducted an IRB-approved semi-structured online user study to examine internet users’ browser choices in South Korea and analyze their usage patterns. Our user study results reveal that there are clearly different users’ browser preferences across different web services, and they are in turn closely related with the security policy enforced by the government 20 years ago. In our study, while younger age group tends to prefer two browsers (Chrome and IE), older age group prefers to use IE browser Also, all age groups commonly prefer the IE browser for the services requiring digital certificates issued from Korean government agencies such as finance and e-commerce sites. Our user study is quantitative to show how the standardization of technologies in a country could affect users’ web browsing activities. Also, despite of the abolishment of the mandatory security technology, we still observe that people are not aware of such abolishment and habitually use technology locked-in IE browser.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationFinancial Cryptography and Data Security - FC 2020 International Workshops, AsiaUSEC, CoDeFi, VOTING, and WTSC, Revised Selected Papers
EditorsMatthew Bernhard, Andrea Bracciali, L. Jean Camp, Shin’ichiro Matsuo, Alana Maurushat, Peter B. Rønne, Massimiliano Sala
PublisherSpringer
Pages3-17
Number of pages15
ISBN (Print)9783030544546
DOIs
StatePublished - 2020
Event1st Asian Workshop on Usable Security, AsiaUSEC 2020, the 1st Workshop on Coordination of Decentralized Finance, CoDeFi 2020, the 5th Workshop on Advances in Secure Electronic Voting, VOTING 2020, and the 4th Workshop on Trusted Smart Contracts, WTSC 2020, held at the 24th International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security, FC 2020 - Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia
Duration: 14 Feb 202014 Feb 2020

Publication series

NameLecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
Volume12063 LNCS
ISSN (Print)0302-9743
ISSN (Electronic)1611-3349

Conference

Conference1st Asian Workshop on Usable Security, AsiaUSEC 2020, the 1st Workshop on Coordination of Decentralized Finance, CoDeFi 2020, the 5th Workshop on Advances in Secure Electronic Voting, VOTING 2020, and the 4th Workshop on Trusted Smart Contracts, WTSC 2020, held at the 24th International Conference on Financial Cryptography and Data Security, FC 2020
Country/TerritoryMalaysia
CityKota Kinabalu
Period14/02/2014/02/20

Keywords

  • Digital certificate
  • Public key infrastructure
  • Web browser

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