EFF Crypto Usability Prize Workshop
2014 EFF Crypto Usability Prize (EFF CUP) Workshop


											
															
																
																		
																			Submission Deadline:
																			
																			May 22, 2014, 5pm PDT
																	
																	
																		
																			Notification Deadline:
																			
																			May 30, 2014 5pm PDT
																	

																	
																			Anonymization:
																		
																			Papers are NOT to be anonymized
																			
																			Length: 
																			
																			500 words 
																			
																			Formatting:
																			
																			PDF              
																			
																			Submission site:
																			
																			email to effcup@eff.org
																	
																	
																	Workshop Date:
																	
																	Wednesday, July 9, 2014              
																
													
									


									SCOPE AND FOCUS
									
									The Electronic Frontier Foundation is evaluating the feasibility of
									offering a prize for the first secure, private end-to-end encrypted
									communication tool.  There is currently tremendous interest in this
									area, with several dozen new projects trying to make encrypted email,
									instant messaging, text messaging, VOIP and video chat a reality.  It is
									not yet clear which of these tools is best-suited to meet real-world
									usability challenges.
									
									
									We believe a prize based on objective usability metrics might be an
									effective way to determine which project or projects are best delivering
									communication security to vulnerable user communities; to promote and
									energize those tools; and to encourage interaction between developers,
									interaction designers and academics interested in this space.
									
									
									The EFF CUP workshop aims both to establish suitable metrics and
									criteria for the prize, and to introduce developers working on open
									source encryption tools (likely contestants) to the privacy and security
									research community. EFF CUP will be held in conjunction with the
									Symposium on Usable Privacy and Security (SOUPS) in July 2014 in Menlo
									Park, CA. We are seeking talk abstracts and position papers on the
									following topics:
									
									
									USABILITY AND SECURITY METRICS: Holding an open competition for secure
									communication tools is a new undertaking and requires new thinking about
									measuring security and usability tools. We are seeking position papers
									on what metrics can be used to most objectively evaluate quality,
									including:
									
									
										Security metrics: Identifying the types of attacks that at-risk
										groups (journalists, activists, lawyers) are subject to, and how we can
										reliably measure the resistance which cryptographic communications tools
										provide.
										 Indirect usability metrics: Metrics which can be evaluated
										analytically, such as backwards compatibility with existing tools,
										integration into existing tools, or demonstrated adoption by N  million
										users.
										 Direct usability metrics: Metrics which can be evaluated through
										user studies, such as the percentage of users who can quickly start
										using a tool and survive various classes of real-world attack. 
									

									
									CURRENT TOOL SUMMARIES: Developers of secure end-to-end communication
									tools are invited to submit a short (100-500 word) abstract describing
									their project. We aim to have a series of short presentations (followed
									by discussion) on the state of various projects, including a description
									of the project's security and usability goals, current development
									status, installed user base and supported platforms, known usability
									challenges and vulnerabilities, and experiences (if any) with user
									testing.
									
									
									EXPERIENCE FROM PAST CONTESTS: Organizers or competitors from other
									technology contests, particularly but not exclusively in the areas of
									security and/or usability, are invited to submit a short (500 word)
									abstract describing lessons from those contests. We aim to have a series
									of short presentations  including a brief overview of past contest's
									goals, setup and rules, and outcomes. Example competitions may include
									cryptographic primitive competitions (eg. AES, ESTREAM, SHA3, PHC),
									Darpa contests, Capture the Flag contests, Crack Me If You Can, VoComp
									or the Netflix Prize.
									



									SUBMISSIONS

									
									Submissions should be made in PDF format, with the topic clearly
									indicated, to effcup@eff.org 
									

									
											ORGANIZERS


											
											Lorrie Faith Cranor, 
											Associate Professor of Computer Science and of
											Engineering and Public Policy at Carnegie Mellon University, Director of
											the CyLab Usable Privacy and Security Laboratory (CUPS).  Member,
											Electronic Frontier Foundation Board of Directors.
											

											
											Peter Eckersley,  
											Technology Projects Director, Electronic Frontier Foundation.
											

											
											Joseph Bonneau, 
											Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for Information Technology
											Policy, Princeton University
											

											