'Consumer comfort with mobile tech safeguards growing'

NEW YORK, USA & BANGALORE, INDIA: The booming growth in the use of mobile technology has apparently made U.S. consumers more comfortable with safeguards as fewer are expressing concern about privacy and security on their wireless devices and networks, according to the results of a recent global "Consumers and convergence" survey by KPMG LLP, the audit, tax, and advisory firm.

KPMG found that 48 percent of the U.S. consumers surveyed on the use of technology (e.g. computers, smart phones, mobile applications and the internet) were very concerned about privacy when using a mobile device, which was down from 58 percent when KPMG conducted a similar survey in 2008.

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By way of further comparison, 54 percent of consumers said they were very concerned about security in this year's survey, compared to 65 percent in 2008. The U.S. findings on this question were lower than the global findings in the survey that consisted of more than 5,000 consumers in 22 countries. Globally, when using mobile devices, 67 percent said they were very concerned about security and 59 percent indicated they were very concerned about privacy.

"The evolving U.S. consumers' sentiment about privacy and security speaks to their greater familiarity and understanding of the convergence of computers, mobile devices and content, and how they can use the technology and services to their benefit," said Gary Matuszak, Global Chair, Information, Communications and Entertainment.  "Anywhere you turn, you can see examples of this, whether it's a person checking their email, texting, buying movie tickets, watching a video, listening to music, updating their Facebook status, or checking their bank account balance on their mobile phone."

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The growing comfort of U.S. consumers with mobile technology is reflected in the survey results which showed more U.S. consumers indicated they were comfortable conducting financial transactions such as mobile banking and mobile credit card transactions than they were in the previous survey.  Comparing the new survey to results 18 months ago, the U.S. group of respondents who said they were comfortable grew by 6 percent, to 16 percent, and those not comfortable declined by 11 percent, to 55 percent. In contrast, about one-third of the consumers globally in the new survey said they were comfortable making financial transactions on a mobile phone.