BNS - The rate of use of internet banking services by residents of Estonia is more than one-third higher than the EU average and Estonians are also significantly more frequent readers of news on the web, it appears from a recent study on cyber security by Eurobarometer.

Users of internet banking make up 85 percent of the population in Estonia, compared with 48 percent in the EU on average. As regards readers of news online, the ratios are 87 percent in Estonia and 64 percent in EU countries on average.

Estonian residents are also somewhat more frequent of users of e-mail than people in other EU member states, the ratios being respectively 89 percent and 85 percent.

When it comes to buying goods and services on the internet, with 46 percent, Estonia is lagging behind the EU average of 53 percent.

Users who most often access the internet when they are at home make up 95 percent in the EU on average and 94 percent in Estonia. Next comes the workplace, from where 38 percent of respondents in all EU countries and 42 percent in Estonia access the web. When asked whether they had changed their password in online environments during the past year, 52 percent of users in Estonia said they had done it in the online bank, as compared with the EU average ratio of 19 percent. The ratio was lowest for internet shopping sites, where 7 percent of users in Estonia and 12 percent in the EU on average had changed their password in the last 12 months.

When asked how concerns about security issues had changed the way they were using the internet, Estonians named installing anti-virus software and not opening mails from an unknown sender most often, or 57 percent in the case of both answers. The corresponding EU average ratios were 51 percent and 43 percent. Overall, users in Estonia are less fearful in conducting transactions on the internet then EU residents on average.

The issues of security causing the most concern in Estonia are the safety of payments, named by 29 percent against the EU average ratio of 38 percent. Next came concern over misusing of personal data, named by 20 percent in Estonia and 40 percent in the EU on average.

The Eurobarometer survey was conducted from March 10-25, 2012 by interviewing 26,593 people across the EU. In Estonia 1,001 people were interviewed.

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