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

Americans Now Spend Just $64 a Month on Streaming Down From $90 in 2021

Recent research from Parks Associates, presented at the StreamTV Show in Denver, CO, highlights a significant trend: spending on streaming services has dropped by 30%, with the average U.S. household...

Research: US SVoD spend drops

Research from Parks Associates shows shifts in demand for streaming video services in the US, including a significant drop in spending. The firm’s latest research from its Video Services Dashboard rep...

Super Bundling: The future of mobile bundling

According to research by Parks Associates, 94% of U.S. internet households have at least one subscription service, and over half subscribe to four or more streaming video services. This growing subscr...

Are Viewers Cutting Back on Streaming?

In a new report from Parks Associates, the researcher reports a significant drop in spending and a declining number of services viewers subscribe to.  "Consumers are spending less, but rather than...