Cybersecurity for All: Towards a Cyber Harm Framework for Citizens

The widespread usage of technology has led to an increase in cyber threats. Organizations use indices to measure, understand, and make decisions in response to cybersecurity threats. However, the same tools do not exist to help individuals to make informed cybersecurity decisions. This work aims to understand the impact of cyber threats on individuals and take steps toward developing a composite indicator that engages them in conversations around cybersecurity. A composite indicator consolidates single indicators around a complex topic, such as cybersecurity, into one, thereby providing a means for measuring a non-trivial topic. A tool such as a composite indicator will help individuals make better cybersecurity policy decisions and enable researchers to benchmark cybersecurity consequences for the general public. However, more data and information are needed to create such a tool.To this end, this work presents semi-structured interviews with people about their exposure to cyber threats and documents some of the challenges and harms of a cyber-related incident. Based on interviews and a literature survey, this work proposes a Cyber Harm Framework for Citizens that reflects the dimensions of harm experienced by users. This framework provides a conceptual starting point for building a composite indicator. In order to develop a human-centered cyber indicator, this work explores the potential social, ethical, and design challenges that must be considered. Future work will focus on integrating the framework into a cyber-harm composite indicator, enabling individuals to make informed cybersecurity decisions.