Trustworthiness in electronic commerce: the role of privacy, security and site attributes France Bel

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Trustworthiness in electronic commercethe role
of privacy, security and site attributesFrance
Belanger, Janine S. Hiller, Wanda J.
SmithJournal of Strategic Information Systems,
2002, pp. 245270
2004. 10. 13 POSMIS Sungjin Kim
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Contents

• Introduction
• Literature review
• Methodology
• Results Discussion
• Conclusion

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Introduction

• This paper uses an experimental design to
  investigate trust in B2C e-commerce
• Questions
• What is the role of four commonly used Web
  privacy and security attributes in evoking
  consumer willingness to purchase online?
• What role does trustworthiness play in a
  consumers interaction with Web merchants?
• What role does web design have in the consumer
  purchase decision?

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Literature Review (1/6)

• Although B2C EC has experienced explosive growth,
  I still only accounts for a very small portion of
  overall consumer spending.
• There is significant potential for B2C EC to
  grow.
• ?For B2C EC to reach its full potential, factors
  that may inhibit or facilitate the growth of the
  market must be better understood.

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Literature Review (2/6)

• Privacy
• Privacy was the biggest obstacle preventing them
  from using Websites. (Business Week/Harris poll
  of 999 consumers in 1998)
• For this research the definition of privacy that
  is adopted is the ability to manage information
  about oneself.
• Security
• Security is the protection against circumstance,
  condition, or event with the potential to cause
  economic hardship to data or network resources in
  the form of destruction, disclosure, modification
  of data.

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Literature Review (3/6)

• Privacy and security statements and third party
  verification.
• Privacy and security statements
• Todays websites vary from excellent and
  well-detailed to hard to find and difficult to
  read.
• Third party verification
• TRUSTe
• BBBOnLine
• Example America Online
• Privacy and security seals may not be well
  recognized by consumers.

Hypothesis 1. Consumers will rank security
features as more important than security seals,
privacy statements, and privacy seals in
considering acquisitions of goods or
services over the web.
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Literature Review (4/6)

• Trustworthiness
• Three main elements of trustworthiness
• Ability
• Integrity
• Benevolence (not considered in this paper)
• Perception of confidence in the electronic
  marketers reliability and integrity
• There may exist a negative relationship between
  perceptions of trustworthiness and the presence
  of trust indices.

Hypothesis 2. The consumers perceptions of a
marketers trustworthiness may be high even when
trust indices (seals and statements of privacy
and security) are weak.
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Literature Review (5/6)

• Entity type
• Electronic-only no physical stores
• Land and electronic have both physical stores
  and
• 
  electronic storefronts.
• It can be expected that assessments of the
  marketers trustworthiness may be much more
  important when transacting with an
  electronic-only marketer.

Hypothesis 3a. When controlling for
trustworthiness perceptions, there will be a
positive relationship between the consumers
purchase intention and their willingness to give
private information to a land and electronic
merchant. Hypothesis 3b. When controlling for
trustworthiness perceptions, there will be no
significant relationship between the consumers
purchase intentions and their willingnessto give
private information to an electronic-only
marketer.
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Literature Review (6/6)

• Design features
• Convenience, ease of use, cosmetics may lead to
  increased willingness to trust or to purchase
  from a website.
• Privacy and security of the online experience is
  not why consumers would go to the internet to
  purchase in the first place.
• The convenience of buying online may be the
  primary reason.

Hypothesis 4. Consumers will report that privacy
and security features are less important than
pleasure features (conveniences, ease of use,
cosmetics) to their intention to purchase.
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Methodology

• Sample
• 140 U.S. southeastern university students
• 4 sites were selected
• 2 electronic-only, 2 land and electronic
  businesses
• Amazon, Foot Locker, Athletes Foot, Smart
  bargains
• Measures
• A seven point Likert type scale ranging from
  strongly disagree (1) to strongly degree (7) was
  used.

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Methodology

• Instrument validation
• Before using the collected data for hypothesis
  testing, the instruments was subjected to
  reliability and validity analyses
• Reliability using Cronbachs alpha
• Validity using Factor Analysis

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Methodology
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Results (1/4)

• Hypothesis 1
• Paired comparison t-test
• Respondents ranked security features (SET, SSL,
  etc.) higher than privacy statements, security
  seals and privacy seals.
• ? SET secure Electronic Transaction
• SSL Secure Socket Layer

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Results (2/4)

• Hypothesis 2
• Relative ranks
• The trust indices ratings (provided by experts)
  were contrasted with respondents relative
  ranking of each sites perceived level of
  trustworthiness
• Ex) Amazon

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Results (3/4)

• Hypothesis 3a and 3b
• Partial correlations
• Electronic only Amazon, Smart Bargains
• Land and electronic Foot Locker and Athletes
  Foot
• Trustworthiness is imperative in the decision to
  provide private information regardless of the
  type of marketer.

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Results (4/4)

• Hypothesis 4
• Regression
• These results suggest that having a satisfying
  and pleasurable experience drives purchase
  intentions regardless of privacy and security
  concerns.

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Conclusion

• The growth B2C EC seems to be non-stoppable.
• For the future growth of B2C electronic commerce,
  barriers such as security and privacy concerns
  must be torn down.
• This research offers a beginning point to
  understanding the relationship and the balance
  between the three elements of trustworthiness,
  privacy and security in B2C EC.