New Yubico Survey: Boomers Have Better Cybersecurity Habits Than Millennials and Gen Z
- Millennials are more than twice as likely to reuse passwords (47%) across their accounts compared to boomers (20%), which increases the risk of account breaches.
- Approximately one third of respondents (32%) are not confident in their ability to spot fraudulent or fake online retailers, indicating a lack of trust in online shopping platforms.
- 37% of millennials save their credit card information in their online accounts, potentially exposing their financial information to hackers.
- Boomers have better cybersecurity hygiene than millennials, with only 47% of boomers reporting that they do not use multi-factor authentication (MFA) compared to 52% of millennials.
- 96% of respondents plan to shop online between October and December, highlighting the importance of reviewing online security habits during the holiday season.
- Consumers' tendency to reuse passwords increases the risk of their online accounts being compromised.
- A significant portion of respondents lack confidence in their ability to identify fraudulent or fake online retailers, indicating a potential risk of falling victim to scams.
- The high percentage of millennials saving credit card information in their online accounts exposes them to potential financial fraud.
- The majority of respondents do not use or are unsure about using multi-factor authentication (MFA), leaving their accounts vulnerable to unauthorized access.
Millennials are twice as likely to reuse their passwords on various shopping sites, leaving them vulnerable to account breaches during a busy holiday shopping season
The purpose of this study is to understand attitudes and perceptions from consumers on cybersecurity across the US and
"While it is technically easy for retailers to implement basic username and password authentication for their customers, these types of credentials alone are easy for attackers to circumvent, allowing unauthorized access to online accounts," said Ben Eichorst, director of infrastructure security at Yubico. "During busy online shopping months, consumers may be tempted to adopt risky habits such as reusing passwords across services, or clicking on order information links that appear legitimate. These kinds of behaviors put consumers at a higher risk for their accounts to be compromised."
Key findings from the research indicate that:
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While
80% of survey respondents are concerned about cybersecurity when it comes to their online accounts,39% admitted to using the same passwords for multiple accounts.-
Boomers are the least likely to reuse passwords (
20% ), while Millennials are more than twice as likely to reuse passwords (47% ) across their accounts.
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Boomers are the least likely to reuse passwords (
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A significant part of online shopping revolves around trusting an online retailer is who they say they are, and effectively safeguarding your personal and financial information. Despite a mistrust of online retailers, consumers are still storing their personal and financial information on these websites.
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About one third of respondents (
32% ) are not confident that they could spot a fraudulent or fake online retailer. - About one in three do not “completely” or “mostly” trust the websites they use to effectively protect their personal/credit card information.**
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33% of respondents save their credit card information in their online accounts.
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About one third of respondents (
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The study shows the Boomers have a greater mistrust of websites than Millennials, potentially leading them to have better online privacy practices.
-
37% of Millennials save their credit card information in their online accounts, while only19% of Boomers do. -
On average, Boomers (
42% ) are almost twice as likely to feel unconfident in their ability to spot a fraudulent online retailer than Gen Z (23% ) and Millennials (29% ).
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Despite being concerned about cybersecurity, approximately one out of two (
49% ) respondents stated that they do not use MFA, don’t know what it is or are not sure if they have MFA turned on.-
As with most other categories, Boomers reported having better cybersecurity hygiene than Millennials, with only
47% of them reporting that they do not use MFA, don’t know what it is or are not sure if they have MFA turned on, compared to52% of Millennials.
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As with most other categories, Boomers reported having better cybersecurity hygiene than Millennials, with only
“
For the full results of the survey, you can download an overview of the report here and the associated infographic here. For more information on Yubico, visit www.yubico.com.
About Yubico
Yubico (Nasdaq First North Growth Market Stockholm: YUBICO), the inventor of the YubiKey, offers the gold standard for phishing-resistant multi-factor authentication (MFA), stopping account takeovers in their tracks and making secure login easy and available for everyone. Since the company was founded in 2007, it has been a leader in setting global standards for secure access to computers, mobile devices, servers, browsers, and internet accounts. Yubico is a creator and core contributor to the FIDO2, WebAuthn, and FIDO Universal 2nd Factor (U2F) open authentication standards, and is a pioneer in delivering modern, hardware-based passkey authentication security at scale to customers in over 160 countries.
Yubico’s solutions enable passwordless logins using the most secure form of passkey technology. YubiKeys work out-of-the-box across hundreds of consumer and enterprise applications and services, delivering strong security with a fast and easy experience.
As part of its mission to make the internet more secure for everyone, Yubico donates YubiKeys to organizations helping at-risk individuals through the philanthropic initiative, Secure it Forward. The company is headquartered in
*Data from two double-opt-in surveys conducted by OnePoll on behalf of Yubico. The first survey polled 1,000
**Gen Z is not reported here because the results were not statistically significant.
View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20231019778867/en/
Yubico Communications Team
press@yubico.com
Source: Yubico
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