Design Research
UI Design
Email Security
Design Challenge
For this project, we redesigned the interactions users have with desktop email clients - your outlooks, apple mails, and windows mails. Things we all use daily and expect to work seamlessly, but that have the power to disappoint and make a mountain out of a mole. We focused our attention on:
- The ability of microinteractions to make those digital chores easier, simpler, more enjoyable - and less noticeable.
- The power of the well-designed user interface to move the task to the periphery, and to bring forward the delight of being able to communicate instantly across the globe.
My Role
Year
S.W.O.T Analysis
Flowcharts
UI Design
Prototyping
Spring 2023
Length
4 weeks
Problem
We are all too familiar with spam emails and phishing scams. 96.8% of email users receive spam messages in some form, and, unfortunately, I know someone who was victim of a scam through her email account. Although preventing spam emails from making it through the vetting process is a systems issue, I wanted to approach this redesign from a UI perspective of allowing users to visualize the data behind their email security system.
How may we empower users to view and track records of Spam emails received?
Cybershield is an integrated cyber security report that keeps record of Spam emails received by the type of spam and its threat level.
Solution
My research focused on the analysis of existing email clients on the market - specifically Gmail, Outlook and Apple Mail - by reviewing their Strengths, Weaknesses, Threats and Opportunities (S.W.O.T).
Research & Observations
Precedents & Competitors
1) AI Powered cybersecurity for businesses. It is subscription bases.
2. Their goal is to prevent threats, identify and limit the impact of threats that reach the user, and secure user data. This is a system solution to introduce further cybersecurity.
3. They provide security reports to the businesses who use their services.
My first flowchart iteration focused on the training of an integrated AI security system into every email account that learned patterns of communication by analyzing the user’s email history and used it as a basis for detecting spam mail.
Flowchart
After presenting my initial flowchart and low-fidelity prototype, I received feedback that pointed out my approach seemed to be geared towards a system solution, rather than a UI design solution. At this point I decided to pivot and took inspiration from my competitive analysis to design a spam security report to help users to keep track of the type of spam they receive and it’s level of threat, while also allowing them to give the system feedback by sending False Positive reports.
Final Digital Product Experience
Midterm Presentation
REFLECTION
In the future, conducting user testing would give me further insight on whether or not this would be a useful or desirable product for current email users. This was a challenging project because Spam detection and protection is an unconventional aspect of email interfaces, as it is often a system/software problem. I am happy with the direction I took and how I was able to translate my proposal into a UI design solution. Although I was discouraged by the many pivots I had to make throughout the process, I am proud of myself for sticking with the task I chose as it was a topic I felt passionate about (Spam and scam prevention), and how I successfully approached a systems issue from a design perspective.