Providing market intelligence for more than 35 years

In The News

Network Security: Hacking Fears Could Scare Consumers Away from Smart-Home Devices

The rising occurrence of high-profile security hacks and privacy breaches, as well as being personally victimized, are contributing to ever-increasing consumer anxiety about smart home devices and platforms, according to new research.

Parks Associates’ latest quarterly survey of 10,000 U.S. broadband households found that almost half of consumers rank data security and privacy issues as their greatest concerns about connecting devices to the Internet, compared to other problems they may encounter, such as with tech support. Forty percent of the respondents say they have experienced a privacy or security problem with a connected device in the past year, most commonly viruses and malware.

“Our most recent data reveals that almost half of U.S. broadband households are ‘very concerned’ [rating 6-7 on a 7-point scale] about hackers getting control of connected devices and hackers getting access to data from the device,” says Parks Associates Research Analyst Brad Russell. “In tracing trending changes on these consumer attitudes from 2014 to 2016, we find that while the total share of consumers who are ‘concerned’ [rating 5-7] has not appreciably changed, the share of those that are ‘very concerned’ has grown by 6% to 7%. Similarly, the share of consumers who are ‘not concerned [rating 1-3] has shrunk by about half.”

From the article "Network Security: Hacking Fears Could Scare Consumers Away from Smart-Home Devices" by Rodney Bosch.

Previously In The News

App for COVID-19 contact tracing faces hurdles, generational divide over privacy concerns

A survey of 5,000 adults by Parks Associates indicates roughly half, 52 percent, are willing to share tracking data in an app while 28 percent are unwilling. Twenty percent are willing but only with p...

Entertainment Giants Reevaluate Their Smaller Streaming Services

“They’re all analyzing and asking, ‘Is it best for us to throw everything into one service, like an HBO Max, or have a main anchor service like a Paramount+, but also have the existence of other servi...

HBO Max Finally Comes To Amazon Fire Devices; No Deal Yet For Roku (But There's A Workaround)

WarnerMedia has yet to clinch a deal to get the service on Roku, the other dominant streaming device — although Roku users now have a workaround for that (more on that below). Together, Amazon and Rok...

How the Pandemic Shaped the CES Agenda This Year

While connected home gadgets have always figured heavily into CES’ agendas in recent years, this year marked a shift in the specific kinds of smart devices people want, according to Jennifer Kent, VP...