As you probably guessed, the general public has a different idea of what “secure” means than security experts do. What might surprise you is how behind the times the general public is despite all the security breaches in the news.

Security stats: Non-experts versus experts

A recent survey of 231 security experts and 294 Internet users who are not security experts illustrated how strikingly different the two are:

• 42% of non-security experts consider the use of antivirus software to be among the top three things one can do to stay safe online versus only 7% of security experts believe that.
• Only 24% of non-experts polled said they used password managers for at least some of their accounts, compared to 73% of experts.
• 89% of security experts polled said they used two-factor authentication, compared to 69% of non-experts.

There is one area that the non-experts shine and that is when it comes to email links: 38% of security experts admitted to clicking on links in email messages from unknown senders, compared to only 12% of non-experts.

Security practices: Non-experts versus experts

Shout out to Google for creating this infographic on the online safety practices of non-security experts versus security experts.

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