Global trends of increasing malware and phishing scams threaten individuals, businesses and critical infrastructures worldwide. As financial authorities look to roll out new security technologies to combat scams, public perception and acceptance of these measures are dependent on whether they are easy, trustworthy and clearly beneficial.
Behavioural research suggests that gain-framed messages and loss-framed messages differentially influence attitudes and behaviours. This study examines whether gain or loss message framing affects public perceptions and acceptance of Fast Identity Online-compliant (FIDO) hardware token (FHT) for high-value internet banking transfers.
A randomised controlled trial (n = 1060) assigned participants to receive either gain-framed messages emphasising enhanced protection benefits or loss-framed messages emphasising negative consequences of phishing or malware scams.
Participants then completed questions assessing 5 adoption drivers of understanding, perceived efficacy, convenience, costs, security; and 1 outcome measure of support for the adoption of FHT. Three factors of cost, security and convenience affected overall FHT support, with less digitally savvy individuals and females showing greater support.
The Gain-frame led to significantly higher confidence in FHT activation and improved perceptions that FHT cost is worth the added security. Gain-framed participants also achieved significantly higher scores on knowledge comprehension tests.
However, substantial barriers still emerged regardless of framing. Only 28% of participants found the FHT convenient, while 68% of participants cited unwillingness to pay. Lower-educated groups showed consistently poorer understanding, highlighting equity concerns that could undermine universal adoption.
These findings suggest that communication can enhance acceptance of security technology on key dimensions but may not overcome fundamental barriers of convenience and costs that threaten adoption of FHT. Successful implementation requires not only positive messaging but also targeted interventions addressing practical concerns relating to cost, security and convenience to improve acceptance of the hardware token which is necessary for enhanced security against malware and phishing scams.