Authentication in the Context of E-Participation: Current Practice, Challenges and Recommendations

Authentication as well as identification are key functions when it comes to online and democratic participatory processes that can be found in the context of e-participation. Until now, research has centered on the development of authentication and identification techniques. Why and how these techniques are currently used and what their benefits are in the context of e-participation is missing so far. In this paper, we aim to address these challenges by reviewing state of the art literature and practice in order to determine how current authentication techniques are used in e-participation. Furthermore, we conduct an expert survey in order to establish a baseline how current techniques are used and perceived. The results show that current practice focuses strongly on the use of the de facto standard user/password in e-participation. However, experts believe that multiple other authentication techniques such as biometrics or electronic signatures will become more important in future applications. Moreover, experts acknowledge the use of various authentication methods suitable for the level of participation, as opposed to current practice that often provides only one way of authentication. These findings will help to further develop and improve future technologies and applications to support participatory processes for citizens' involvement.