Empirical Software Engineering
Prof. Dr. Yasemin Acar
We work towards empowering society to protect people from digital harms.
We strive to improve security, privacy, equity, and accessibility through our research, teaching, and beyond.
We address social challenges that may be exacerbated by technology, and leverage empirical research methods with end users and non-users of technology, developers, administrators, educators and other decision makers to make it easier to safely develop and use technology devoid of social harm.
We use qualitative and quantitative human computer interaction methods (surveys, interviews, focus groups), large scale measurements, and mixed-methods approaches.
Our goal and approaches are inclusive, and we love collaborating with cryptographers, open source developers, corporate software developers, system administrators, users and non-users of software.
Research
We use qualitative and quantitative human computer interaction methods (surveys, interviews, focus groups), large scale measurements, and mixed-methods approaches.
Our goal and approaches are inclusive, and we love collaborating with cryptographers, open source developers, corporate software developers, system administrators, users and non-users of software.
About us
News
Publications
Analyzing Security and Privacy Advice During the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine on Twitter
J. Schmüser, H.S. Ramulu, N. Wöhler, C. Stransky, F. Bensmann, D. Dimitrov, S. Schellhammer, D. Wermke, S. Dietze, Y. Acar, S. Fahl, in: F. ’Floyd’ Mueller, P. Kyburz, J.R. Williamson, C. Sas, M.L. Wilson, P.O.T. Dugas, I. Shklovski (Eds.), Proceedings of the CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2024, Honolulu, HI, USA, May 11-16, 2024, ACM, 2024, p. 574:1–574:16.
Decomposing and Measuring Trust in Open-Source Software Supply Chains
L. Boughton, C. Miller, Y. Acar, D. Wermke, C. Kästner, in: Proceedings of the 2024 {ACM/IEEE} 44th International Conference on Software Engineering: New Ideas and Emerging Results, NIER@ICSE 2024, Lisbon, Portugal, April 14-20, 2024, ACM, 2024, pp. 57–61.
"Those things are written by lawyers, and programmers are reading that." Mapping the Communication Gap Between Software Developers and Privacy Experts
S.A. Horstmann, S. Domiks, M. Gutfleisch, M. Tran, Y. Acar, V. Moonsamy, A. Naiakshina, Proc. Priv. Enhancing Technol. 2024 (2024) 151–170.
A Mixed-Methods Study on User Experiences and Challenges of Recovery Codes for an End-to-End Encrypted Service
S. Höltervennhoff, N. Wöhler, A. Möhle, M. Oltrogge, Y. Acar, O. Wiese, S. Fahl, in: D. Balzarotti, W. Xu (Eds.), 33rd USENIX Security Symposium, USENIX Security 2024, Philadelphia, PA, USA, August 14-16, 2024, USENIX Association, 2024.
The Challenges of Bringing Cryptography from Research Papers to Products: Results from an Interview Study with Experts
K. Fischer, I. Trummová, P. Gajland, Y. Acar, S. Fahl, M.A. Sasse, in: D. Balzarotti, W. Xu (Eds.), 33rd USENIX Security Symposium, USENIX Security 2024, Philadelphia, PA, USA, August 14-16, 2024, USENIX Association, 2024.
"These results must be false": A usability evaluation of constant-time analysis tools
M. Fourné, D.D.A. Braga, J. Jancar, M. Sabt, P. Schwabe, G. Barthe, P.-A. Fouque, Y. Acar, in: D. Balzarotti, W. Xu (Eds.), 33rd USENIX Security Symposium, USENIX Security 2024, Philadelphia, PA, USA, August 14-16, 2024, USENIX Association, 2024.
Show all publications