Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/10/09/americans-lack-basic-digital-s.html
Most U.S. adults answer fewer than half questions correctly on digital know-how quiz, and many struggle with cybersecurity and privacy
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Who is Jack Dorsey?
Lame question
What does the grey lock mean in your browser address bar?
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If you are a programmer, devop, admin, or engineer you know this. We are surprised this stuff runs at all. Computers, websites, and systems that Users interact with are way too complicated. The corporations and hackers have one thing in common, they are always trying to rip off the user.
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Jack Dorsey is the CEO of Twitter , not a security question, but possibly an attempt to create a proxy value for tech obsessed people.
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Some of these questions seem a trifleâŚquestionable.
I assume that Iâm supposed to answer âyesâ to the âhttps://â one; but the fact that a site is using TLS tells me only that things are being protected over the wire(possibly not even then if my browser isnât being quite strict about site scripts sneaking form inputs out various creative back channels); not anything about what is being done on the backend.
The âtrue two-factorâ question seems downright mean: using the word âtrueâ suggests that youâll be sneaking some trick untrue-second-factors into the mix; yet âphone numberâ is the first example given despite the fact that SP 800-63B has some nasty things to say(â5.2.10 Restricted Authenticatorsâ) about how those suck at being second factors.
And the Jack Dorsey question? I donât even. (Incidentally, heâs the most vagrant-chic of the insufferable techbros; but that knowledge is abjectly useless unless political winds shift enough that we get to start picking them out of lineups).
I donât doubt that the news is awful; both because I have a view of user competence somewhere between âjaundicedâ and âbitterly misanthropicâ; and because they are up against adversaries with shockingly superior resources and effective impunity in most cases; but this seems like a pretty dodgy test.
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The survey was about knowledge of the digital world in general, but Dorsey is definitely someone who security-conscious consumers should be aware of.
In addition, those who like liberal democracy might also be justifiably wary of Jack.
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I should send this questionnaire to my bankâs executive team.
Why do I have stronger (2FA) security on my HomeDepot wish list and purchase history than I do on my primary bank account and mortgage provider?
Trick question, though, because very soon they will no longer be my primary bank account provider.
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Nothing too surprising here. Iâve given up on my family; they flat refuse to use any sort of password manager, instead insisting upon using the same poorly chosen passwords across many different sites. Nothing I say makes any difference, so at this point Iâm just waiting for when I have to say âI told you.â
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Sarcastic gasp!
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File this under the âno fucking shitâ hashtag.
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