Touch Interaction For User Authentication

This thesis explores whether these new capabilities might support novel password schemes that could be a viable alternative to traditional text passwords. We conducted a preliminary study with a graphically oriented password scheme called Passgrid and a main study with a multi-touch password scheme called GesturePass, which we designed to focus more on gestures. Our study compared Passgrid to a text password scheme in terms of login time, effect of screen size, and the overall user experience. Our findings showed that users made little use of the multi-touch capability and so Passgrid had longer login times. We then designed GesturePass specifically to focus on gestures and smaller touchscreen devices. Our study compared the usability of GesturePass to a PIN password scheme. GesturePass required more initial practices, and had somewhat longer login times, but required a similar number of login attempts.