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RESEARCH, ANALYSIS & TRENDS

ESET Report gets granular on cyber security

knowledge, behavior and attitude in Asia

According to the Asia Cyber Savviness Report, re- cyber security, said they were keen to learn more.
leased by ESET, 93% of online users in Asia worry
about cyber security. In its recent report, the global pro- Still, considering that Asia Pacific has the highest num-
vider of security solutions highlights that the region still ber of internet users in the world, the results of the
has a long way to go in understanding online security study points out that users in this region don't know
and protecting themselves. how to stay safe online. Moreover, a large share of
those polled commit basic mistakes like using pass-
Polling 1,800 respondents from across Hong Kong, In- words containing easy to access personal information,
dia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand, the such as their date of birth or surname, storing pass-
survey aimed to gain insights into the attitudes, words and credit card details online, and connecting to
knowledge and user behaviors across Asia when it unsecured public Wi-Fi networks.
comes to cyber security. Interestingly, ESET's study ranked Malaysia as the
most 'cyber-savvy' nation in Asia Pacific, ahead of Sin-
More education needed to boost cyber security gapore, India, Thailand, Hong Kong and Indonesia in
awareness that order.

The study quizzed respondents about common safety Cyber-savviness is based on factors such as the ability
risks online in order to find out how much they actually to understand activities likely to make them vulnerable
know about cyber security. While 68 %of online users online, risky behaviors while surfing the web, and the
said that they are aware of online security issues, they steps users take to protect themselves online. Surpris-
were however often unable to answer questions regard- ingly, the results showed that consumers in countries
ing cyber security practices. with higher cyber savviness didn't necessarily take all
the right precautions, nor were they fully aware of the
In the Asia Pacific region, the lack of formal education cyber security risks that common online activities pose.
is a huge issue, the study revealed, as 4 in 10 online
users said they gained most of their information about For example, users in India and Indonesia take the
online security through unofficial sources such as doing highest number of precautions despite having the low-
their own online research or from their families and ac- est levels of cyber security awareness. On the other
quaintances. hand, countries like Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand,
which ranked amongst the top in ESET's awareness
On an encouraging note, over 78% of the surveyed re- survey came in near the bottom when it came to pro-
spondents that didn't have any formal training about tecting themselves.
4 Asian eMarketing August 2015: Security
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