  The purpose of this study was to measure whether participant education,
profession, and technical skill level exhibited a relationship with
identification of password strength. Participants reviewed 50 passwords and
labeled each as weak or strong. A Chi-square test of independence was used to
measure relationships between education, profession, technical skill level
relative to the frequency of weak and strong password identification. The
results demonstrate significant relationships across all variable combinations
except for technical skill and strong passwords which demonstrated no
relationship. This research has three limitations. Data collection was
dependent upon participant self-reporting and has limited externalized power.
Further, the instrument was constructed under the assumption that all
participants could read English and understood the concept of password
strength. Finally, we did not control for external tool use (i.e., password
strength meter). The results build upon existing literature insofar as the
outcomes add to the collective understanding of user perception of passwords in
specific and authentication in general. Whereas prior research has explored
similar areas, such work has done so by having participants create passwords.
This work measures perception of pre-generated passwords. The results
demonstrate a need for further investigation into why users continue to rely on
weak passwords. The originality of this work rests in soliciting a broad
spectrum of participants and measuring potential correlations between
participant education, profession, and technical skill level.
