6 February 2008
Four in five UK Internet users have confessed to feeling unsafe sharing their mobile phone number via the contact areas of social networking sites such as; Facebook, Bebo and MySpace. Nearly 80% of all respondents in a recent Mobyko.com survey stated they would not publicise their own number in this manner.
The findings show the reason behind this growing trend of cautiousness is the innate lack of trust regarding users within an individual’s online social network.
Julian Saunders, CEO of Mobyko.com said:
We know that people freely share their mobile numbers in the physical world. But, when it comes to doing so in the virtual world different factors come into play.
It could be argued that the majority of people within our virtual communities are simply people we’ve either never met or perhaps just the once and are not necessarily trusted acquaintances. This raises the question; would we have bothered to keep in touch if social networking hadn’t gone mainstream?
The Mobyko.com study researched trust in relation to the valuable content on people’s mobile phones. It found that 10% of UK users openly confess to frequently checking their partner’s mobile phones, without permission to do so.
The most checked items are; text messages (90%), call history (75%) voicemails (40%), photos and videos (35%). The findings also revealed that we’re becoming mobile snoopers with nearly one in ten of us regularly sneaking a peek at a stranger’s mobile phone when travelling on tubes, buses and trains.
Saunders concluded:
As consumers we need to better manage and protect the valuable content carried around both in our pockets and published on the web. These findings point toward a growing level of distrust and ‘sticky beak’ syndrome across the UK.
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