The findings reveal that there are vast differences in wireless internet usage in homes across Europe. Only 52 per cent of internet users in Germany connect to the internet wirelessly at home, in contrast to 74 per cent in Spain. The majority of people in Germany that have a wireless internet connection at home (96 per cent) make sure that their wireless network is secured, whereas no more than 80 percent of respondents do the same in France.
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Internet users in 10 European countries were asked whether they have a wireless internet connection, with an average of 64 per cent of respondents answering ‘yes’ across all countries. Individual countries were ranked as follows:
Spain – 74%
Italy – 71%
UK – 71%
Denmark – 69%
Netherlands – 66%
France – 63%
Belgium – 63%
Poland – 57%
Sweden – 52%
Germany – 52%
From these 64 per cent of respondents with a wireless internet connection at home the following percentage answered positive on the question if their wireless network security is enabled:
Germany – 96%
UK – 92%
Denmark – 89%
Netherlands – 89%
Sweden – 87%
Spain – 85%
Italy – 84%
Poland – 83%
Belgium – 82%
France – 80%
Across all but one of the regions the youngest group of respondents (18-24) have the highest percentage of secure wireless networks and the lowest percentage of security enabled wireless networks can be found in the 55+ age group.
Wireless Internet Activities
Social networking is a frequent activity for internet users in most countries, most notably the UK, Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Denmark, Spain and Sweden. But surprisingly, internet users in Germany, France and Poland are more likely to be viewing videos than social networking, when asked which activity they do at least once a month. Similarly, online shopping features highly amongst internet users in the UK, Netherlands, Germany, France, Poland and Denmark, but does not rank in the top four online activities for Italy, Spain and Belgium. E-mailing and surfing the web were by far the most popular activities across all the countries surveyed.
Key facts/findings :
- Computers/laptops are by far the most common devices connected to wireless networks (84%), followed by printers (32%) and games consoles (22%)
- The survey found that emailing (95%) and surfing the net (91%) were the most popular activities respondents did at least once a month
74 per cent of people online used their connection to shop at least once a month, compared to average of 61 per cent of people across all countries surveyed - Over half (56%) of the internet users surveyed used social networking sites at least once a month
- Increasingly, TVs are being sold with integrated network/Internet connectivity. 31 per cent of respondents said they would consider buying a TV that can be connected to your home internet network and a further 22% would consider this if it was wireless.
Gareth Jones, Regional Sales Manager UK, Cisco, commented:
This study lifts the lid on wireless internet usage across Europe, revealing big differences in how people access the internet and what they do once they are online. It’s interesting to see the UK leading the way in adopting wireless connections and making sure that those wireless networks are secured. We expect to see more and more people convert from fixed line to wireless internet access during 2010, with even more wireless-enabled devices connecting to those networks, such as games consoles.