Behind passwords: An analysis of preliminary results in order to understand how users protect their privacy

Abstract

Nowadays, the Internet is the most common source of information, it is the means of almost any activity, such as shopping, online banking, getting informed or keeping contacts. Users need to know privacy regulations, read privacy and cookie policies to protect themselves against illegal or unwanted data use. The answers obtained to our questionnaire have been analyzed and they prove our hypothesis that users’ privacy awareness is low, and highlight that users need a deeper education in privacy protection. In our questionnaire people were asked general questions, such as “Do you always read cookie policies?” or “Do you have deep knowledge of privacy regulations?”, and more specific questions, such as “Have you ever used the Hungarian National eHealth Infrastructure (EESZT)?” or “Do you know that Facebook plugins follow all your online activities?”.