Pew: Americans Are Changing How They Use Facebook

According to a report from the Pew Research Center, many Americans are changing how they interact with Facebook, with 44 percent of users aged 18 to 29 claiming to have deleted the Facebook app from their phone.

A report from the Pew Research Center by Andrew Perrin states that over the course of the past 12 months, half of Facebook users aged 18 and older (approximately 54 percent of the platform’s user base) say they have adjusted their privacy settings, which follows the tech giant’s recent user data breach scandals in which the personal data of 84 million users was allegedly left vulnerable.

Pew reports that approximately 42 percent of Facebook users say they have taken a break from the social media website for several weeks, while 26 percent of users say they deleted the Facebook app from their phones. Combined, approximately 74 percent of Facebook users who have either adjusted their privacy settings, taken a break from the platform or deleted the platform’s app from their phone.

The Pew Research Center’s findings come from a survey of U.S. adults from May 29 to June 11, shortly after the release of details relating to the Cambridge Analytica user data scandal. There is a notable age difference in user reactions to Facebook though, approximately 44 percent of younger users between the ages of 18 and 29 deleted the Facebook app from their phone, while only 12 percent of users over the age of 65 deleted the app. Older users are also much less likely to have updated their Facebook privacy settings.

Pew also notes that since the Cambridge Analytica scandal, approximately one in ten Facebook users have downloaded their personal data from the site. Approximately  47 percent of the users who have downloaded their data from Facebook deleted the app from their phone while 79 percent adjusted their privacy settings after viewing the information Facebook collected on them.

Read the full report from Pew here.