[tor-bugs] #28088 [UX/Research]: User Needs Discovery: Kenya

Tor Bug Tracker & Wiki blackhole at torproject.org
Wed Oct 17 14:52:33 UTC 2018


#28088: User Needs Discovery: Kenya
---------------------+-----------------------------
 Reporter:  nyinz    |          Owner:  antonela
     Type:  defect   |         Status:  new
 Priority:  Medium   |      Component:  UX/Research
  Version:           |       Severity:  Normal
 Keywords:  ux-team  |  Actual Points:
Parent ID:  #27010   |         Points:
 Reviewer:           |        Sponsor:
---------------------+-----------------------------
 Region: East Africa
 Country: Kenya

 Kenya is a developing country in EastArica which has an ethnic diversity
 that is sometimes a source of conflict. Social media is a widespread
 platform and many people use mobile devices to make social connections and
 financial transactions. The price of data is high but affordable for the
 middle to upper class citizens.
 Other challenges include high unemployment, crime and poverty.

 **Introduction/objective**
 We conducted the needs discovery activity in September with different
 groups of users from Mombasa and Nairobi. We did this to get a better
 comparision about how people were feeling across the country. The aim of
 the activity was;
 -to see what needs/goals people had and...
 -to guage how Tor can help fulfil them
 **
 Participants**
 We tested people aged 20-50 years from human rights backgrounds and civil
 society organisations. In total, we recieved feedback from 21 partipants
 of whom most were women. Most of the particpants had not used Tor before.
 They had knowledge about digital security and were using the internet for
 email and social media accounts. Generally, for this group the tech-level
 is medium.

 **Methodology**
 The trainer gave an explaination of the activity and asked them to write
 down responses to the following on post it notes:
 -who is your adversary?
 -what is the attack from your adversary?
 -How would you protect yourself from these attacks?

 **Results**
 (What they said)

 **What is happening with Tor users?**
 Most people consider the government and government agencies; cyber
 criminals; big telecoms and individuals they already know as adversaries.
 That is, factors that may deter them from doing their jobs.

 We saw that typically in all the groups, censorship, confiscation of
 devices and arrests are attributed to government and government agencies.
 Surveillance and tracking were also linked to the government but there was
 a sense that other adversaries were at play. For example, big telecoms and
 OR individuals.

 Theft of devices;targeted malware attacks like finisher/pegasus;Identify
 theft and online financial fraud were mostly attributed to Individuals.
 'Hacker' type people or persons with malicious intent.

 **what are the users trying to do?**
 As mentioned, most of the participants were women. The needs discovery
 shows that women want to communicate securely and fight cyber crime. They
 want to be active on social media without the threat of gender-based
 violence.

 Most people had heard about encryption and want to take profit of this
 technology even though it's historically non user-friendly software. They
 want to use software that encrypts content.

 Most participants were concerned about the safety of their personal files.
 They want to store and share data more safely.

 Finally, this group is trying to browse securely and anonymously so they
 can freely work on human rights issues in the region.

 https://storm.torproject.org/shared/3A7z6KkZ06WlbsLSegizbppuvcXd47yVZM7NohmlGCl

--
Ticket URL: <https://trac.torproject.org/projects/tor/ticket/28088>
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