Investigating the Usability Issues Non Crypto Savvy Users Encounter When Setting Up Desktop Wallets for Staking (D)PoS Cryptocurrency
Geoff Robertson
Kennedy Whitehead
Summary
We tested five desktop wallets for staking (D)PoS cryptocurrency with fifteen non crypto savvy users to better understand the usability issues they face when interacting with the crypto / decentralized world for the first time. Our findings revealed particular problems with this demographic’s ability to:
- Secure a wallet application appropriately (i.e. comprehension and actions involving wallet encryption, private keys, and/or BIP39 passphrases)
- Fund a wallet (i.e. comprehension and actions involving the transfer/sending of cryptocurrency to the wallet)
- Stake cryptocurrency within a wallet (i.e. comprehension and actions involving configuring the wallet application so to earn rewards on cryptocurrency funds held by the wallet).
The issues surrounding this demographic’s ability to secure the wallet (private key and/or application) appropriately are the most concerning and, perhaps, most in need of industry-wide attention as these issues will most likely be exhibited by other first-time users entering the space.
Further, we believe these issues are the result of the novel UI elements found in crypto wallet applications not aligning with new users’ existing mental models for how the mechanisms of typical application security work. Here, said mental models are based on experience with elements found in the UI of applications built to accommodate both the architecture and underlying mechanisms of a centralized system. Whereas the novel elements found in the UI of crypto wallet applications are built to accommodate the architecture and underlying mechanisms of decentralized systems.
As a result, new users, who are familiar with the security paradigm of user-generated, single-string passwords — which are stored mentally and are retrievable via the centralized system if forgotten, are completely thrown off by the presentation of system-generated, multi-word pass/seed/recovery phrases which must be stored physically or digitally and cannot be retrieved via the decentralized system if lost. Simply put, they do not understand what to do much less the ramification of not doing it properly
Therefore, we stress the importance of User Accountability Design in the UX surrounding wallet security (private key and application). Guidelines and details for this practice are provided in our Suggestions section below.
1. OVERVIEW:
Importance
The importance of this study centers around the notion that in order for cryptocurrency to reach mainstream adoption, it must become relevant, consumable, and easy to use by a demographic group defined in the Technology Adoption Life Cycle as the Early Majority.
The Early Majority, unlike Innovators and Early Adopters, are not likely to use things that are overly technical and complicated to use. Therefore, it’s imperative that anyone pushing the development of cryptocurrency and relevant technology understand the needs of this target demographic.
Methods
For this study we recruited 15 participants matching the target demographic of not crypto savvy but crypto curious. Meaning, they had never interacted with cryptocurrency before but were interested to learn what it was all about.
All participants were run individually between the dates of June 13th — 19th, 2019. Session times were set for 1 hour. During which, participants were tasked with the primary objective of using a provided testing device (2017 13" MacBook Air running MacOS 10.14.5) to set up one of the five wallet applications (selected as testing material for this study) in order to stake its respective cryptocurrency and earn rewards.
The selection criteria for the wallet applications used as the testing material in this study were as follows:
- They provided staking functionality for a specific PoS / DPoS cryptocurrency
- They required a (relatively) low minimal investment in order to earn staking rewards
- They held comparable feature sets / functionality but with variations in their UI / UX design
The participant to wallet applications assignment pairings for this study were as follows:
- Participants 1–3 interacted with the Lisk desktop wallet (v 1.18.0) in order to stake Lisk.
- Participants 4–6 interacted with the BlockEQ desktop wallet (v 1.0.1) in order to stake Stellar (XLM).
- Participants 7–9 interacted with the ARK desktop wallet (v 2.4.1) in order to stake ARK.
- Participants 10–12 interacted with the Neon desktop wallet (v 2.2.1) in order to stake NEO.
- Participants 13–15 interacted with the PIVX desktop wallet (v 3.3.0) in order to stake PIV.
Disclaimer:
- We were not asked or paid to use these wallet applications in the study
- We do not endorse these wallet applications or their respective cryptocurrency
- We are not critiquing these wallet applications or their development teams — rather exploring the design paradigms presented within their interfaces
Analysis
Participant screen interactions, verbal commentary, and body language were recorded for analyses. Here, analysis centered around seven pre-established Areas of Focus:
- Download: The participant’s ability to find and download the wallet application.
- Install: The participant’s ability to install and launch the wallet application.
- Add: The participant’s awareness of / ability to add a new wallet within the wallet application.
- Secure: The participant’s awareness of / ability to secure the private key / wallet application appropriately with provided options.
- Synchronize: The participant’s awareness of the synchronization process between the wallet application and the network.
- Fund: The participant’s ability to fund the wallet with cryptocurrency.
- Stake: The participant’s awareness of / ability to configure the wallet / wallet application to stake and earn rewards.
During analysis, qualitative data coding was used to effectively place each participant into one of three categories for each (applicable) Area of Focus based on their behavior and verbal commentary. These three (color) categories were as follows:
- (Green) The participant was able to complete the relevant task(s) /deduce the system’s status / understand the underlying concept
- (Yellow) The participant struggled to complete the relevant task(s) / deduce the system’s status / understand the underlying concept
- (Red) The participant was unable to complete the relevant task(s) / deduce the system’s status / understand the underlying concept
2. FINDINGS:
The matrix below depicts our categorical findings for each Participant x Wallet Application x Area of Focus. However, for the more detailed findings regarding each specific Area of Focus, please watch the videos in the corresponding sections below.
AoF 1: Download
The study’s first Area of Focus, Download, regarded the participant’s ability to find and download the wallet application.
This Area of Focus was applicable to all five wallets and therefor all fifteen participants. 8 out of the 15 participants demonstrated and/or conveyed issues with their ability to find and download their respective wallet application.
AoF 2: Install
The study’s second Area of Focus, Install, regarded the participant’s ability to install and launch the wallet application.
This Area of Focus was applicable to all five wallets and therefor all fifteen participants. 4 of the 15 participants demonstrated and/or conveyed issues with their ability to install and launch their respective wallet application.
AoF 3: Add
The study’s third Area of Focus, Add, regarded the participant’s awareness of / ability to add a new wallet within the wallet application.
Four of the wallet applications in the study’s lineup had some form of this specific functionality. However, only three required participants to use it in order to progress towards their primary objective.
Therefor, this Area of Focus was applicable to three wallets and subsequently nine participants. 3 of the 9 participants demonstrated and/or conveyed issues with their awareness of / ability to successfully add a new wallet within their respective wallet application.
AoF 4: Secure
The study’s fourth Area of Focus, Secure, regarded the participant’s awareness of / ability to secure the wallet’s private key and/or wallet application appropriately with provided options.
This Area of Focus was applicable to all five wallet applications and therefor all fifteen participants. 14 of the 15 participants demonstrated and/or conveyed issues with their awareness of / ability to secure the wallet’s private key and/or wallet application with the provided options presented within their respective wallet application.
AoF 5: Synchronize
The study’s 5th Area of Focus, Synchronize, regarded the participant’s awareness of the synchronization process between the wallet application and the network. Here, synchronization refers to the act of downloading and verifying a full copy of a respective blockchain.
This Area of Focus was applicable to one wallet application (PIVX was the only full-node wallet application in the study’ lineup) and therefor only three participants. 3 of the 3 participants demonstrated or conveyed issues with their awareness of the synchronization process.
AoF 6: Fund
The study’s 6th area of focus, Fund, regarded the participants ability to fund the wallet application with cryptocurrency.
To simulate this we pre-loaded a second testing device, an iPhone X running iOS 12.3, with five corresponding mobile wallet applications — each funded with their own respective cryptocurrency.
This area of focus was applicable to all five wallet applications and therefore all fifteen participants. 12 of the 15 participants demonstrated and or conveyed issues with their ability to fund the wallet with cryptocurrency.
AoF 7: Stake
The study’s 7th and final area of focus, Stake, regarded the participants awareness of / ability to configure the wallet / wallet application to stake and earn rewards.
More to come…
3. SUGGESTIONS:
The following video contains a brief review of the study along with our design suggestions for UX improvements.
