While many are claiming to appreciate the value of their memories more than any other form of data stored on their digital devices, they are willing to sell them for little money, as revealed recently research of Kaspersky Lab.
One of the surveys showed that for 49% of people their personal and sensitive photos are the most valuable thing they have on their devices, followed by pictures of their children and their spouses.
The thought of losing these precious memories is more stressful than the possibility of a car accident, a separation with their partner or a quarrel with a friend or family member. However, when faced with the decision to erase these data in exchange for money, people give their digital data - such as photos - for very small amounts of 10,37 €.
When asked, people argued that their digital memories have a special place in their hearts, perhaps because these memories are considered irreplaceable. Over 2 / 5, for example, declare that they were unable to replace photos of their 45%, children (44%) or 40%.
Research shows that the possibility of losing these precious memories is extremely stressful for most people people. In fact, Kaspersky Lab's latest studies indicate that people often value their devices and photos more than their partners, friends and pets.
Kaspersky Lab asked participants how stressed they would feel about various events, such as a relative's illness person, ένας χωρισμός με το σύντροφό τους, ενα αυτοκινητιστικό accident, a possible loss of their digital photos or contacts and a few more situations.
Across the globe, a relative's illness comes first on the list of stressful events a person can experience. The loss or theft of a device, coupled with the loss of digital photographs, is second and third to most of the world's nationalities, leaving the list of stressful situations in the car accident, separation with the partner, a bad day at work, quarrels with family members or friends, pet illness and a few more cases.
However, an experiment carried out on behalf of Kaspersky Lab by media psychologists at the University of Würzburg also showed researchers a contradictory result: for all their love for their personal data, people are willing to sell it at extremely low prices .
Experiment participants were asked to assign a monetary value to the data stored on their smartphone - including photos of family and friends, contact information, and personal documents.
Surprisingly, the values people assigned to their data were significantly lower than expected, given the distress they said they would experience if they were to lose their data. People tend to value their financial information and payment details more (€13,33 on average) than other forms of data. Contact details were thought to be worth €11,89 on average and generic photos frompricewere only €10,37 on average.
In addition, the experiment has shown that people are more likely to exchange their most precious memories with money. When a fee was paid to the participants (based on the above amounts) to delete their data (no data was actually deleted), photos with family members and friends, personal documents and photos of the participants themselves were the categories of data have been more frequently approved for deletion.
"Our experiment showed interesting and representative results: while people believe they understand the value of their data, emotional value is not reflected in their daily actions. On the one hand, people seem to be aware of the types of data that are more important to themselves - they believe that the loss of their digital memories, such as photos, is extremely painful. On the other hand, people have limited information about the value of their data, giving them a minimum monetary value. They know they are emotionally important, but they are not in a position to appreciate their value yet. One should remind them actively of what they deserve the data before they are shared, or allow someone to delete them, "commented Andrei Mochola, Head of Consumer Business, Kaspersky Lab.
For more information about experiment and research, you can view the report: "Risking data heartache: It hurts to lose the data you love».
