What Americans want to hide on their smartphone

SAN FRANCISCO, USA: Clean Master today announced the findings of a new smartphone privacy survey, which was conducted by TNS as a national poll of 1,000 U.S. adults.

The results, which were revealed with the launch of the free new Clean Master app version 4.0 for Android, show that more than half of Americans (52 per cent) would be embarrassed about friends or family seeing certain files or documents on their smartphone.

The number one file American's don't want others to see on their smartphone isn't porn or dirty pictures of themselves, but bank account information. 1 in 4 (25 per cent) Americans don't want that seen by others on their smartphone.

Emails or texts written on a smartphone (24 per cent) came in as a close second, followed by emails or texts received (23 per cent), websites visited (15 per cent), and porn (10 per cent). 8 per cent of Americans said they would be embarrassed about friends or family seeing naked selfies on their smartphone.

When asked who Americans most want to prevent from accessing files on their smartphone, friends rank #1 (22 per cent), followed closely by children (21 per cent) and co-workers (21 per cent).

Other choices include boss (18 per cent), parents (12 per cent), and spouse or significant other (12 per cent), strangers (12 per cent) and hackers/criminals (8 per cent). Most Americans (81 per cent) feel the need to keep files on their smartphone private.

"Our research proves there's a real need for American smartphone users to have more control over the privacy of their most intimate and personal information," said Sheng Fu, CEO of KS Mobile.

"While Americans might not consider smartphone maintenance or safety a priority, those who are interacting with mobile devices so personally need a protection and performance tool that is easy to use, effective, and accessible. Clean Master is uniquely designed to meet these needs," added Fu.

The survey also discovered that smartphone privacy concerns vary by gender, with men twice as likely as women to have naked photos of themselves on their phone (7 per cent of men vs. 3 per cent of women) and four times as likely to have naked photos of others (9 per cent of men vs. 2 per cent of women).

Conversely, women are more likely than men to not have a security code to keep their phone private (19 per cent women vs. 13 per cent men). Additionally, men are more likely than women to be embarrassed about friends or family seeing the following content on their smartphone:

* Websites they have visited (20 per cent men vs. 11 per cent women)

* Porn (15 per cent men vs. 5 per cent women)

* Photos of others (13 per cent men vs. 5 per cent women)

* Videos of others (8 per cent men vs. 3 per cent women)

Furthermore, out of more than half (58 per cent) of American adults who have a smartphone, 1 in 4 (27 per cent) feel the need to delete data or files to make storage space available, with 14 per cent indicating they feel the need to do so, either very often or often.