Humanising digital security
The Vodafone Secure Net app is an app designed to keep you and your family safe from online threats. With a range of features such as Parental Controls, a Cleaning Infection Tool, a Digital Safety Score, and ID Monitoring, the app provides comprehensive protection against a variety of online threats.
1 month
App
The aim was to create a personalised report screen that provides customers with a clear and concise overview of the threats detected by Secure Net, and how the app is protecting them against those threats. We believe that this will help customers to feel more informed and in control, and ultimately, provide them with greater peace of mind.
In collaboration with the data analytics team, we discovered that customers have a clear need for a tool like Secure Net to stay secure online. However, we also found that over half of them feel that these tools are too complicated to understand. This insight highlights the importance of designing tools that addresses their concerns around complexity, making it easier for them to stay safe and protected online.
Although the current design of the Secure Net app serves its functional purpose by displaying threats that are being blocked, we recognised that the presented content lacked appeal and needed to be more humanised to make the security threats more relatable and understandable for customers, and to create a sense of empathy between the app and the user.
To better inform our customers about Secure Net protection, our initial focus was on identifying relevant data that we could retrieve from the platform. With this information in hand, we began to explore our design system to convey our ideas, however, the modular components may not effectively present engaging data.
One of the key questions we asked ourselves was how we could present data in a visually appealing way while also ensuring that it was easily readable and understandable for our users. We found inspiration in infographics and data visualisation patterns, which helped us to see how simple design elements such as colour, type, and white space could effectively convey messages to our users.
Drawing from our research, we devised a set of questions aimed at enhancing the user experience. These questions serve to clarify and simplify the understanding of Securenet's protection level for our customers:
How might we simplify the complexities of cyber security?
How might we educate our customers to be always informed on latest online secuity?
How might we evolve our design system that feels more engaging and easier to understand?
Building on the insights gained from our design research, we developed a solution that strikes a balance between elegance and engaging data display. Our aim was to create a design that would effectively communicate the information while also being visually appealing and impactful.
We ran a 6x 45-minute remote mobile usability testing sessions with existing Vodafone Secure Net customers in the UK and Spain. Below are some key findings from the sessions:
Overview screen - Participants understood the information on the screen well. One participant asked if the red highlighting of '89' indicated higher priority. The section on malicious websites was of interest to most participants and they felt it would help them identify sites to avoid.
Educational screen - Participants found the page's content to be too generic and not in line with their expectations. They were anticipating a personalised list of blocked threats specific to their family, but were disappointed by the generic information provided.
Devices bar chart screen - Participants had a positive response to the feature, as it fulfilled their expectation of viewing their blocked threats upon clicking '89 blocked threats'. Although not immediately clear to everyone, most enjoyed the interactive graph and appreciated being able to see the devices mostly affected by threats, including their children's devices, once they understood it.
Websites list screen - All participants commented that they had already see this information on the previous Devices bar chart screen, and questioned why they were seeing it again.
Following usability testing, we simplified the experience to avoid confusion while retaining the app’s engaging and impactful look and feel. We made several changes to the user interface, such as simplifying the navigation, reducing the number of steps required to complete tasks, and improving the visibility of important information.
To improve Secure Net's value to customers, we redesigned the protection and content to be more engaging and relevant, incorporating push notifications and a humanised design. We are exploring the use of CRM to further enhance the user experience. Breaking away from the modular interface was positively received as it allowed us to present information in an elegant and visually appealing way, creating a unique experience.
