More than half (52%) of Internet users around the world are more concerned about their online privacy than they were a year ago.
This is according to the Internet Security and Trust survey conducted by global market research firm Ipsos on behalf of the Centre for International Governance Innovation.
The survey, conducted between December 2017 and March 2018, polled 25 262 Internet users from across 25 different countries, with 1 000 of respondents being from SA.
The research found that user trust in the Internet continues to be threatened by concerns about privacy and security issues. As global reliance on the Internet grows, so too does the threat from hackers and cyber criminals who prey on Internet users.
According to Ipsos, three quarters (74%) of respondents said the negligence of Internet companies contributes to their growing concern over online privacy, second only to cyber criminals at 81%, and ahead of other Internet users (66%), government (63%), companies in general (61%), foreign governments (58%) and employers (48%).
The research highlights that more South Africans feel the government should do more to protect its citizens online then they did a year ago.
"Around 34% of South African respondents expressed a level of distrust in the government, saying that government had contributed to an increase in online privacy concerns over the last year, while 30% felt that they 'somewhat agreed', that the South African government is not doing enough to protect its citizens online," notes the report.
Interestingly, respondents from the US (78%) were most likely among the countries polled to point to their own government as a source of rising concern, and are among the most likely (83%) to say that Internet companies specifically are a source of this growing concern.
Social media privacy
Furthermore, in terms of Internet companies contributing to an increase in online privacy concerns, the research found that 84% of local respondents believe that Internet companies and social media platforms such as Google, Twitter and Facebook contributed to an increase in online privacy concerns: with 48% of South African respondents saying these companies contributed "a great deal", and 36% stated that they "somewhat agreed" with this statement.
Given the recent media focus on issues of data ownership and data breaches, the research revealed that globally, Internet users also expressed a high level of distrust in social media platforms and Internet companies, with 63% of respondents claiming that social media has too much power, and another 42% believing that social media influences their political point of view more so than search engines (39%), online apps (35%) or online advertisements (32%).
Early this year, the New York Times and London's Observer reported that data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica harvested private information from more than 50 million Facebook users and developed techniques to support president Donald Trump's 2016 election campaign.
The firm, which has since closed down, built a system that could profile individual US voters, in order to target them with personalised political advertisements.
Facebook was recently in the hot seat when EU lawmakers grilled CEO Mark Zuckerburg about the social network's data policies.
The Ipsos research further revealed six in ten (62%) Americans believe that social media has too much power, while citizens in emerging markets such as Nigeria (84%), Egypt (81%) and Kenya (79%) agreed.
According to a report by the Ponemon Institute, South African organisations are more exposed to data breach incidents than their counterparts across the globe, having scored the highest probability of experiencing a data breach in the next 24 months.
Finally, in response to this increasing concern and distrust of the Internet, many users around the globe are changing their behaviour online, with around one in ten global Internet users choosing to make fewer online purchases (12%), closing social media accounts (10%), or using the Internet less often overall (7%), compared to one year ago, says Ipsos.
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