About four in ten LINE users have witnessed account hijacking

When I first read the headline figure I thought it was rather high, but the text mentioned hijacking included friends’ Facebook posts promoting sunglasses, which I was seeing about once every couple of weeks last year, although it seems better recently. Anyway, this survey from the chat and SNS service LINE was into the security literacy of their members in the run-up to their “Cyber Disaster Prevention Day” on the 9th of June.

Just to fill up some space, here is a UFO Catcher full of LINE characters:

Research results

Q1: Have you ever had these experiences on an SNS, other internet service? (Sample size=1940, multiple answer)

Had my account hijacked	7%
Family member had account hijacked	3%
Friend, acquaintance had account hijacked	30%
None of the above	62%

Q2: Which of the following internet trouble-related terms do you know in detail? (Sample size=1940, multiple answer)

Account hijacking	71%
Virus, malware	56%
SMS authentication code	51%
Spam	47%
Phishing site, mail	45%
Two-factor authentication	44%
Cookie	38%
Firewall	36%
SSL	21%
Targeted attack	14%
Ransomware	7%
DDoS	7%

Q3: On an everyday basis, how aware are you of internet, device, etc security? (Sample size=1929)

	Very much	Somewhat	Not really	Not at all
All	16%	54%	27%	3%
Male	20%	54%	23%	3%
Female	12%	54%	31%	2%
Female, 20-39	8%	54%	35%	3%
Housewife, 20-39	4%	47%	48%	2%

Q4: When using internet services, which of the following do you usally try to do? (Sample size=1929, multiple answer)

Don’t click links in dodgy-looking email, LINE messages	74%
Don’t use easy-to-remember PINs like 1234, 0000, etc	70%
Don’t use my birthday, house number, other relevant-to-me numbers as PINs	54%
Switch on screen lock passwords for PC, smartphone	41%
Don’t keep a memo on my smartphone of passwords, credit card numbers, etc	41%
Regularly update pattern files for virus software	28%
Use different passwords for different services	19%
None of the above	4%

Q5: Which of the following LINE features do you know about? (Sample size=1940, multiple answer)

How to block dodgy LINE accounts	20%
How to prevent logins to the LINE store from PC and iPad	11%
How to forceably log out logins I don’t recognise	8%
How to report hijacked accounts	7%
None of the above	68%

Demographics

Recently LINE asked 1,940 users of its service aged between 15 and 69 years old to complete a private internet-based questionnaire. No further information was provided.