The survey showed that 61% of Americans surveyed felt somewhat safe online, with 24% feeling very safe. A full 87% of those surveyed felt safer going online using their home PCs than their mobile phones.
“Americans are feeling like they have control over their home computers, but when you look more deeply into what they are doing to protect themselves by running more robust security software, they are not doing quite as well”, Michael Kaiser, executive director of NCSA, told Infosecurity.
At the same time, only 37% of those surveyed had a complete security software suite installed on their home PCs. A complete software security suite was defined in this study as a basic firewall, antivirus, anti-spyware, anti-phishing, identity, and spam protection, Kaiser explained.
Only 28% of Americans felt somewhat safe online using their mobile phones; that number dropped to 18% for those who felt very safe.
“With mobile devices…people just don’t understand what they do and how they do it online as well as they do with their home computers”, Kaiser said. “With mobile, people are unsure what kind of information it collects about them.”
Just 22.2% of those surveyed back up personal data stored on their phones, despite using them to keep private information such as personal contacts, calendars, and e-mail.
More than 64% said they always or sometimes read a developer's privacy policy before downloading an app on their phones. Yet, only 5.7% believe they store passwords or account numbers in their apps, and 23% believe they have ever used location-aware technology on their phones to track their whereabouts. This contrasts to a recent Mobile Marketing Association study that showed 63% of iPhone customers use location-based services once per week.
Half of Americans now have two to three computers at home, with 74% owning a laptop or netbook and 31% saying the laptop or netbook is their primary computer. Nearly 17% can connect to the internet via their TV, and 24% connect via a gaming device.
These multiple points of connection pose new security risks. The study found that 70% had a wireless router at home, but 43% admitted they have logged onto a wireless network without entering a password – a number that increases to 66% for 18 to 29 year olds.
“Logging into a wireless network without a password is probably one of the riskiest things they can do,” Kaiser said. “The security advice we give to people is, be very careful on any wireless network that doesn’t require a password.”
Marian Merritt, Norton Internet Safety Advocate, observed that on a WiFi network, there are a number of risks consumers can run into, “like 'evil twin' networks that trick people into connecting to unknown networks, giving cybercriminals access to their computer and its contents. Consumers should ensure they're connecting to a legitimate network, using the access keys or portal given to them by the Wi-Fi provider."
Kaiser advised consumers to make sure that they have a full software security suite on their PCs and keep this suite current and up to date. On mobile devices, he suggests that consumers do some research, find out what kind of information is residing on their mobile device, and investigate tools to secure their devices. Using a password on a mobile device is a good security measure, he said. People also need to make behavioral changes to be more aware of what they are doing online and to consider the security consequences of their actions on the web.
For the study, NCSA commissioned a Zogby International survey of 3498 Americans and Norton by Symantec conducted checkups of 400 Americans' PCs.