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Almost half of S’poreans can’t bear to part with mobile phones, even for one day: Survey

SINGAPORE — Almost half of Singaporeans cannot bear to part with their mobile phones for even one day, and only 3 per cent would be willing to give up their phones permanently.

SINGAPORE — Almost half of Singaporeans cannot bear to part with their mobile phones for even one day, and only 3 per cent would be willing to give up their phones permanently.

These were the findings of a nine-country study commissioned by cloud services provider Limelight Networks, which showed that Singapore comes above average when it comes to mobile phone dependency.

In Singapore, 48.7 per cent say they are stuck to their phones, putting the country fourth after India (68 per cent), South Korea (55.7 per cent) and Japan (49.8 per cent).

The average is 47.6 per cent. The United States has the least dependency, with only 35.7 per cent saying they can’t put away their phones.

Findings of the survey, which polled 4,500 people across the nine countries between May 12 and May 29, were collated into a State of Digital Lifestyles report, which was released on Wednesday (July 31).

The study also polled people in France, Germany, Italy and the United Kingdom.

The survey was wide-ranging, polling respondents for their dependence on other devices such as a computer, a tablet, and a digital assistant like an Amazon Alexa or Google Home, among others.

India topped the charts for all these indicators by a mile, except for polls on their use of Internet-enabled security devices — such as surveillance cameras and smart locks — and health and fitness trackers.

Singapore beat India to the ownership of security devices, with more than one in four people using at least one such device.

Singapore also leads in the ownership of health and fitness trackers, with more than 39 per cent saying that they own one such device today.

SINGAPOREANS MOST ANNOYED WITH DIGITAL CONTENT

Despite high technology adoption rates, Singaporeans are most frustrated with accessing digital content, the study also found.

Ninety-three per cent of people here are annoyed with content that would either stop playing or keep on buffering, take too long to download, or throw up an error message.

It could be because among the nine countries surveyed, Singapore is where most people (close to 42 per cent) prefer watching a movie online.

The loading issues could also account for why Singapore has most people tuning in to music offline. The study had more than 45 per cent here indicating that they listen to music offline, while 46.8 per cent said they stream their music online.

On the topic of privacy, the study found that Singaporeans are the most concerned about their personal information being stolen by smart home devices.

Three in five people here worry about the privacy of data collected.

This could be why Singaporeans held off their purchases, with only 23.8 per cent of people here saying that they own a smart home device — below the study’s average of 28.2 per cent.

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