Why people replace their aging smart devices: A push–pull–mooring perspective

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During the last decade, the Internet of Things (IoT) has become a central enabler for technological developments and services, such as ambient assisted living and localization services. Billions of smart devices have been sold, with many aged devices still in use today. In several cases, such aged smart devices do not receive security updates after some time of operation, making them a threat to the privacy of end-users. For this reason, it is crucial to understand driving factors for users to keep older devices as well as factors that lead to device switches, which can be considered as a security measure against cyber threats in this context.In this paper, we analyze what factors people associate with replacing older smart devices with newer ones as a way to mitigate the risks linked to aged smart devices. To achieve this, we apply the push-pull-mooring framework to integrate privacy, adoption and switching theories into a unified framework. To empirically validate the framework, we conducted an online survey among N=513 owners of older smart devices (i.e., purchased more than a year ago) from the UK through the Prolific platform. The results of our study show that perceived usefulness of new devices was strongly associated with switching intention. These results offer only limited support for technology adoption theories, as switching intention was not associated with other adoption constructs (pull factors). Privacy concern regarding improper access to personal information collected by an older smart device and switching costs (a push and a mooring factor, respectively) were also associated with switching costs. The results also indicate support for the moderating role of age of smart device, since the latter associations were not significant for smart devices up to three years old. We also provide some practical implications for manufacturers with a green and sustainable future in mind.