Brief Summary:

Avast’s Digital Citizenship Report on post-pandemic online behavior examines the current landscape of internet behaviors, perceptions, trends and statistics and their effect on internet users. In this survey that ran from June 15th to June 27th 2021, we worked with YouGov and Forsa  to discover global attitudes towards the internet, including how safe and confident people feel and the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on internet usage.

Key global findings:

• Many people will continue to stay online: Six in ten global respondents reported that the internet has become more significant to their lives due to the pandemic. 33% of respondents overall expected to continue to do more activities online due to the ease they have become accustomed to. 31% of people aged 65 and older agreed with this, whereas only 17% of 18-24 year-olds did. It could be inferred that this age group may have already conducted more activities online than older people.

How has the importance of the internet changed for you since the start of the Covid pandemic?

• The internet has been educational: One-third of the respondents overall reported that the internet has helped them learn and experience new things during the pandemic. By age, 28% of 55-64-year-olds agreed, and 23% of people 65 and over. One in five of the respondents from every age bracket said increased internet usage has improved their confidence with technology; 20% of people in the 18-24 age group, and 18% of those aged 65 and older.

How have your online activities changed since the start of the Covid pandemic?

• As online populations grow, so do data protection concerns: Almost everyone agrees that data protection is important. A full 83% of respondents said they believed it is, yet only 43% have strong trust in data protection laws. Two-thirds of all respondents reported avoiding certain digital activities online because of security and privacy concerns. This is especially marked amongst women, 68% of whom did this, and people over the age of 65, 69% of whom said they decided not to do something digitally over these concerns.
• Lack of understanding and knowledge about digital privacy: We noted a general lack of understanding and knowledge about online privacy rights. Just 53% of people said they’re well-versed on privacy rights. 49% of our global respondents report that they read a website’s privacy policies. 
• Dating, sports class and banking moved to the online world: We found that people around the globe were more likely to engage in a host of activities during the pandemic. 35% have increased their online shopping, and 25% have done more online sports class

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