# Password Managers--It's All about Trust and Transparency
## 3 Materials and Methods
### Usability Test and Interview Study  
A usability test and a semi-structured interview study were conducted in Cardiff University, United Kingdom. Participants were recruited by sending emails to university staff members and students, and distributing brochures as well. In total, 30 participants responded to our email request and registered to take part in the study voluntarily. The 30 participants are from nine different schools, including computer science, engineering, law and journalism. The majority of participants are students, most of them are male (21 males and 9 females) and the age range is between 24 and 45 years old. Each participant completed the usability test using LastPass password manager, they did a number of tasks (Table 2) provided by the researcher, for example: create an account in LastPass, store an account/password, generate a password using a random password generator, enable multi-factor authentication, add a driving licence and recover a LastPass account. Regarding the seven tasks in this study, the idea for these tasks comes from a pioneering study by [PERSON] et al. [10]. These tasks were also applied in another study [16; 27]. The usability test has seven tasks because LastPass has many features and functions within it. None of the participants were asked to use their own passwords, email addresses or usernames. For the purposes of the study, usernames, email addresses, passwords and a master password were provided by the researcher to make the participants more comfortable during the usability test. The 30 participants used Windows 10 operating system to do the usability test, the versions of LastPass used during the study were between 4.31 and 4.36, but the change of versions did not affect the study at all. The interface of LastPass in the usability test was configured to English and the whole study took around an hour for each participant to complete. Each participant was given a briefing information sheet which explains the purpose of the study, and after that they signed a consent form to participate. Likewise, participants were given a briefing sheet after finishing the study which contains a thank you message, explains what will happen to the results and how they can contact us in the future. Participants were asked a series of questions which were explained to them to ensure that they fully understood the questions. Participants were asked about their views on the interface design, language and usability of LastPass and about password managers in general during the interview. The researcher observed the participants during the usability test to ensure that any questions could be answered quickly, and to maintain a comfortable atmosphere for them as well. The researcher wrote down the participants' answers and comments during the usability test and interview study. The data for this study is stored in a secure place and treated with full confidentiality. For the usability test, participants answered a set of questions about the use of LastPass using Likert scales, ranging from \"1\" strongly disagree to \"5\" strongly agree, and from \"1\" very dissatisfied to \"5\" very satisfied, and open-ended questions. After participants answered usability questions, they were asked another set of questions in the interview which were open-ended questions and direct closed-ended questions (Yes/No), they could add comments to justify their answers as well. The aim of this section of the study is to investigate any similarities between users and non-users when they use a password manager, if current password managers are easy to use, trusted and to what extent users and non-users are satisfied with and knowledgeable about them. Furthermore, participants could test the usability of a password manager and give feedback regarding its design and functions.