Millennials live their whole lives online—yet most are not concerned about government spying.
It’s a fact confirmed in study after study—a poll earlier this year found that the NSA is more popular among millennials than any other generation.
Now a new study from the Media Insight Project—a collaboration between the American Press Institute and the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research—finds that just 2 in 10 millennials worry “a good deal” about their privacy.
And when they do worry about various aspects of privacy, government surveillance is low on their list of concerns. Only 22 percent worry even “a little” about the government’s access to their personal information, compared to 38 percent who worry about identity theft, and 30 percent who fear that “corporate America” is monitoring their activity.
Overall, 46 percent worry “only a little” about privacy in general, and 34 percent don’t worry at all. Of those who are worried, only 34 percent are concerned about the government in particular. 58 percent of this group worries about identity theft.
Their biggest concern seems to be potential employers seeing their embarrassing Facebook photos—86 percent said they had changed their behavior or privacy settings, and removed photos or other incriminating information.
The study surveyed 1,046 millennials, with a margin of error +/- 3.8 percentage points.
