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With the increasing proliferation of security-critical voice-based services such as voice banking, user authentication on smart speakers is becoming a vital requirement. Prior research on verifying the speaker’s identity has been taken a technical perspective predominantly, while respective user-centered research is scarce. To investigate authentication methods for smart speakers from a user’s perspective, we conducted a multi-method experiment. In a comprehensive online survey (n= 696) and a comparative lab study (n= 18) with an advanced functional prototype we studied 6 authentication methods (spoken PIN, biometrics, app with button/voice confirmation, card reader, sound authentication) regarding their perceived security and ease of use. While token-based authentication approaches (in particular an authenticator app on a smartphone) typically are perceived as more secure, they are found inferior when it comes to the ease of use. The currently most frequently used authentication method for smart speakers, the spoken PIN method, seems to represent a compromise between security and ease of use. The sophisticated sound authentication was appreciated for its ease of use, however, was rated worst regarding the perceived security.

Voice assistants have become embedded in people’s private spaces and domestic lives where they gather enormous amounts of personal information which is why they evoke serious privacy concerns. The paper reports the findings from a mixed-method study with 65 digital natives, their attitudes to privacy and actual and intended behaviour in privacy-sensitive situations and contexts. It also presents their recommendations to governments or organisations with regard to protecting their data. The results show that the majority are concerned about privacy but are willing to disclose personal data if the benefits outweigh the risks. The prevailing attitude is one characterised by uncertainty about what happens with their data, powerlessness about controlling their use, mistrust in big tech companies and uneasiness about the lack of transparency. Few take steps to self-manage their privacy, but rely on the government to take measures at the political and regulatory level. The respondents, however, show scant awareness of existing or planned legislation such as the GDPR and the Digital Services Act, respectively. A few participants are anxious to defend the analogue world and limit digitalization in general which in their opinion only opens the gate to surveillance and misuse.

Chatbots sind Software-Assistenten, mit denen in geschriebener Sprache interagiert werden kann. Die Fortschritte in der künstlichen Intelligenz und insbesondere in der Verarbeitung natürlicher Sprache haben der Technologie in den letzten Jahren einen Schub verliehen. Während diese im Kontakt mit Kunden bereits häufig anzutreffen sind, existieren wenige wissenschaftliche Studien zur innerbetrieblichen Anwendung von Chatbots. Diese Arbeit untersucht anhand eines funktionalen Prototyps mit Mitarbeitenden einer Bank und eines Krankenhauses in der Schweiz die Frage, inwiefern ein innerbetrieblicher Chatbot den IT Service Desk in relevanten Use Cases entlasten kann. Basierend auf den Erkenntnissen zur Benutzerfreundlichkeit und zur Eignung einzelner Anwendungsfälle kann auf die Nutzungsabsicht und somit eine tatsächliche Nutzung durch Mitarbeitende geschlossen werden. Für die Beurteilung des Entlastungspotenzials für den IT Services Desk durch innerbetriebliche Chatbots müssen allerdings Nutzen und Aufwände (z. B. für Entwicklung und Betrieb des Chatbots) abgewogen und unternehmensspezifisch beurteilt werden.

Today’s smartphones provide the technical means to serve as interfaces for public displays in various ways. Even though recent research has identified several new approaches for mobile-display interaction, inter-technique comparisons of respective methods are scarce. The authors conducted an experimental user study on four currently relevant mobile-display interaction techniques (‘Touchpad’, ‘Pointer’, ‘Mini Video’, and ‘Smart Lens’) and learned that their suitability strongly depends on the task and use case at hand. The study results indicate that mobile-display interactions based on a traditional touchpad metaphor are time-consuming but highly accurate in standard target acquisition tasks. The direct interaction techniques Mini Video and Smart Lens had comparably good completion times, and especially Mini Video appeared to be best suited for complex visual manipulation tasks like drawing. Smartphone-based pointing turned out to be generally inferior to the other alternatives. Examples for the application of these differentiated results to real-world use cases are provided.

Context-aware systems offer entirely new opportunities for application developers and for end users by gathering context data and adapting systems behaviour accordingly. Especially in combination with mobile devices, these mechanisms are of high value and are used to increase usability tremendously. In this paper, we present common architecture principles of context-aware systems and derive a layered conceptual design framework to explain the different elements common to most context-aware architectures. Based on these design principles, we introduce various existing context-aware systems focusing on context-aware middleware and frameworks, which ease the development of context-aware applications. We discuss various approaches and analyse important aspects in context-aware computing on the basis of the presented systems.