Norwegians more cautious with web searching

Norwegians internet users have been found to be more cautious with their cyperspace behavior ever since U.S. whistleblower Edward Snowden revealed American authorities' wide-scale internet monitoring, according to a survey report. Snowden's revelations show how almost everything you do online can be registered by one or more intelligence services. One in six Norwegians have stopped using search engines for fear of undesirable consequences, said the report issued in association with the International Privacy Day, which falls on Tuesday. The survey, which was conducted jointly by the Norwegian Data Protection Authority (NDPA) and the Norwegian Technology Council, finds that Snowden revelations have led to self-censorship among a significant portion of the Norwegian population. Sixteen percent of the 1,501 respondents have refrained from specific web searches as they are not certain about how the information they post can be used again later, shows the survey. A quarter of the respondents have also taken on oral conversation instead of electronic communication while 46 percent say they are more concerned about privacy now than they were two or three years ago. Only 2 percent of the surveyed say they are less concerned than before. Eighty-seven percent of the respondents say they are very or fairly concerned about privacy. In 1997, this figure was 77 percent. In the survey, 45 percent of the respondents say that the Snowden act of whistleblowing is unacceptable while 12 percent believe it is non-problematic. 27 percent believe it is worrisome but necessary. However, very few people actually do anything to protect themselves from being monitored. Only 5 percent of the surveyed say that they have changed the use or stopped using certain services or communications channels as a result of Snowden revelations although a great number of them think that they are being watched. "I must say I am amazed at the numbers on cooling. We can see the first signs here that people have begun to restrain themselves in terms of what they do on the internet," Bjoern Erik Thon, director of the NDPA, was quoted as saying. "A significant proportion of completely ordinary citizens censor words themselves," said the report. Thon said that Snowden's revelations and the feeling of being difficult to control their own data may be the cause of the cooling. Women and men respond almost equally to the survey and level of education has no substantial impact on the result. But, younger people are found to be more concerned about their privacy than the older ones.