Cyber Snooping: One In Five Women Admits To Checking On Their Partner

One in five women admit to logging on to their partner's email or social network surreptitiously, according to research from security company Norton. One in 10 men admitted to doing likewise.

The research reveals a growing trend of cyber snooping in the UK.

Thirteen per cent of Brits also admitted to having lied about their age online or to having adopted a fake identity.

The report also found that 19 Brits fall victim to an online crime a minute. However, only 16 per cent of cyber crimes are being reported to police.

The survey, which was conducted by StrategyOne, polling 20,000 people across 24 countries, found three times as many people in the UK had fallen victim to online crime than had suffered from street crime in the last twelve months. Norton estimates that online crime cost Brits around £1.1 billion a year.

Yet it isn't all bad news, with more than half (52 per cent) of under 25-year-olds saying they shared the email or social network password with their partner. For the 45-54 age group, that figure dropped to 33 per cent.

"Cybercrime is hitting Brits in the pocket," said Sam Ellis, a security expert at Norton. "But the report also found questionable online ethics among the general population."

Comments

[Kenz300]

09:19 PM on 09/08/2011

Lack of ethics was exposed in the phone hacking scandal.

When the media, police, politicians and the wealthy are all in bed together where are the ethics in society?

[bandguy]

05:40 PM on 09/08/2011

Trust means an open door policy or passwords, as it were.

[dbrett480]

09:00 PM on 09/07/2011

And 4 out of 5 women are lying.

[StansDad]

06:36 PM on 09/07/2011

Who needs trust in marriage when you can just hack your partner's facebook?

[floodberg]

03:13 PM on 09/07/2011

Respect and trust in a marriage.

My wife and I had very different upbringings, but we shared a deep respect for each other and recognized that there was still a need for privacy.  It came out in odd ways: 

♦ Telephone etiquette 1: If one of us answered a call, we'd ask the other leave to take the call (naming the caller), take it in front of the other unless requested, and afterward clarify what the call was about as long.  (Legal calls; I'd nod and head for the study, she'd waive me out.) 

♦ Telephone etiquette 2: If one answered a call for the other, we'd never ask the identity of the caller but always offer to take a message.

♦ Mail etiquette: If mail came in addressed to the other, we'd set it aside for them; even though she paid the bills she'd always put them aside for me to open.  Personal letters were usually addressed to both, but we'd hold it for the one who was closer to the person who would read it and pass it over so we could talk about it. 

♦  Email etiquette: We shared a personal email, which she graciously handled.  She'd point out stuff I had to know about (eg, guests coming), and I never looked at her personal chatty email. 

We shared a home and finances so it looked silly to a lot of people.  But it a constant reminder to us and everyone that we had the ultimate personal respect for each other.

If I remarry (no living together), I'll respect and trust my spouse again.  If I don't trust, I shouldn't be married,

[colinmeister]

03:27 PM on 09/07/2011

Telephone etiquette 2. I always ask the identity of the caller, then I can say who is calling when I tell my wife. Sometimes she doesn't want to talk to the caller, and I can just say "She must have gone out, what is your number, I'll ask her to call you back". Of course, with caller ID we know who's calling anyway.

[floodberg]

04:29 PM on 09/07/2011

TBH, 99 times out of 100 we knew who the caller was.  That 1% was junk calls, maybe an old friend from college or something who just introduced himself anyway.  I have caller ID, and most of the time the unknown company calls are junk so I let 'em roll.  My wife did have an ex, and when he called my wife always asked me to stay if she had to talk to him. When he discovered he couldn't borrow money from her (he had a serious coke problem) he faded away.  She's passed on, but every year I quietly root for a hurricane to hit him in Kildevil Hills; this time it did.