A survey by NordVPN  revealed that Canadians are mostly worried about their financial transactions (82%), stored personal pictures (41%), and files as well as links shared with others (37%) being made public.

They conducted the survey in eight countries: Australia, Canada, the US, the UK, Germany, France, the Netherlands and Poland. They asked respondents one simple question: “Which part of their digital life are they the most worried about being made public?”. Then they summarized the answers and represented the frequency of them as percentages.

The survey was conducted by the NordVPN Research department for the period from March 29 to April 3, 2021. The survey’s target group was residents over the age of 18, and the sample was taken from national internet users. Quotas were placed on age, gender, and place of residence.

They found out that in the US concern over the exposure of financial data (e.g. credit card numbers) tops the list as the primary concern for 72% of respondents. Then, coming in at around 30%, they’ve got online messages, personal pictures, shared files and links, and browsing history. Understandably, Americans seem more worried about financial losses than embarrassing privacy leaks.

Canada, Australia, the UK and France follow almost identical patterns to the US:

  • 82% of Canadians fear exposing financial data the most, while the second most common fear is exposure of stored personal pictures (41%)

Source: NordVPN