Security is about preventing adverse consequences from the intentional and unwarranted actions of others. What this definition basically means is that we want people to behave in a certain way… and security is a way of ensuring that they do so.

Bruce Schneier, Beyond Fear

A simpler way of thinking about Interaction Designers is that they are the shapers of behavior. Interaction Designers… all attempt to understand and shape human behavior. This is the purpose of the profession: to change the way people behave.

Jon Kolko, Thoughts on Interaction Design

(Italic emphases are original; bold emphases are mine)

It’s interesting to see such similar language used in two fields which are rarely seen as related. But they are, of course: they are about human interaction with technology. To some extent, security – certainly the design of countermeasures – may be a rigorous, analytical subset of interaction design, just as interaction design is a subset of the intersection of technology and psychology. Designers in one field ought to be able to learn usefully from those in others.

Interaction design is not commonly defined as Jon Kolko does above – it was reading that specific quote on his website which persuaded me to buy his book – but it’s pretty close to the idea of design with intent.