Four in five adults (79%) regard internet access as their fundamental right, according to a new survey carried out by GlobeScan for the BBC World Service. The survey was conducted across 26 countries and polled more than 27,000 adults. It found that 87% of those who used the internet felt that internet access should be “the fundamental right of all people.” More than seven in ten (71%) non-internet users also felt that they should have the right to access the web.
Main findings:
Countries where very high proportions regarded internet access as their fundamental right included South Korea (96%), Mexico (94%), and China (87%). 78% said they felt it had brought them greater freedom, 90% said they thought it was a good place to learn, and 51% said they now enjoyed spending their spare time on social networking sites like Facebook or MySpace.
The poll also showed that most internet users feel that the internet should not be regulated by governments. More than half (53%) of internet users agreed that “the internet should never be regulated by any level of government anywhere”—including large majorities in South Korea (83%), Nigeria (77%), and Mexico (72%).
Asked what aspect of the internet they most valued, people most commonly identified the ability to find information of all sorts (47%), with its next most popular aspect being the ability to interact and communicate with people (32%). The internet’s roles as a source of entertainment (12%), as a tool to locate, research, and buy products and services (5%), and as a forum for creativity and sharing of content (3%) were less commonly mentioned as its most valuable aspect.
The poll also found that fraud was the aspect of the internet that caused people most concern, with 32% saying it was what worried them most. Fraud emerged as a greater public concern than violent and explicit content, which was mentioned by 27%, and threats to privacy, which were the major concern of one in five people (20%).
The poll was commissioned as part of the new BBC season of programmes investigating the power of the Internet.
Click here to read the full results
Photo from Creative Commons: Flickr: Jonathan W
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