Newsroom Special - The pop-up problem

    Newsroom Specials

    Wednesday, 3 July 2019 - 6 minutes

    Most of us have a knee-jerk reaction to pop-ups when we are using our devices – to close them down as quickly as possible so we can get on with what we were doing. But is this assumption that pop-ups are nothing more than annoying interruptions putting our digital security and privacy at risk?

    Notifications that you need to update your phone or your computer are pop-ups we are all familiar with. We know they are important as they will fix a bug and improve how our devices are working, or they will be a patch to improve our security and protect from the cyber bad guys trying to get our personal and financial information. Unfortunately, no matter how important they are, they always seem to pop onto our screen at the most inconvenient times.

    Research by Avast suggests that nearly half (47%) associate even official update messages with feelings of ‘impatience, irritation and apprehension’.

    To discuss why so much of Britain’s software is out of date and how our in-built tech habits are causing us potential loss we were joined by tech psychologist, Dr. Mark Neath and consumer security expert for Avast, Stephanie Kane.

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