Study Finds That Users Willing To Install Unknown Software For Money

We all like to get paid for stuff that we do, which is why we have jobs, but would you be willing to potentially install malware on your computer for money? Well that’s what a study attempted to find out. The study was led by Nicholas Christin at the Carnegie Mellon University, and the study wanted to see how much money they would have to pay a user in order for them to install unknown software on their computer.

According to Christin, they did not tell users whether the software they would be installing was a threat to their computers. All they said was that users had to install the software and let it run, and after an hour they would get paid anywhere between $0.01 to $1. Yes, you read that right, payments would be as low as $0.01, and yet there were still users out there who would do it!

Thankfully for these users, the software installed was harmless due to it being an experiment, but yet the danger and potential is out there for those with less than honorable intentions to offer money to users to have them willingly install malware on their computer which could steal passwords, account login information, credit card numbers, and so on.

Based on their findings, 22% of users who saw the offer were willing to download and install the program for a mere $0.01. When the price was jumped to $0.50, that number increased to 36%, and at $1, the study found that 43% of users were willing to download and install the mysterious software! It’s amazing that despite the warnings and breaches out there that there are still users who are willing to sacrifice their security for a bit of money, but what do you guys think?

Tyler Lee
Categories: General
Tags: study