CW+ Premium Content/CW Nordics

Public confidence in global social media operators Facebook and Google retreated in Sweden last year amid growing public distrust over personal data use and online privacy. The “trust factor” contributed to a decline in Facebook’s popularity in Sweden in 2019, according to a survey conducted by Internetstiftelsen (Internet Foundation Sweden), the public service organisation tasked with ensuring the positive development of the internet in Sweden. The Internetstiftelsen survey, Swedes and the internet 2019 (in Swedish, Svenskarna och internet 2019), revealed that public confidence in social media giants Facebook and Google declined by 17% in Sweden from 2015 to 2019. The annual survey is a useful tool to measure online behaviour in Sweden as well as societal changes in the face of increasing digitisation. Sweden is among the most digitised of the Nordic countries. More than 98% of Sweden’s households are connected to the internet, while access to fibre increased to 57% of homes in the fourth quarter of 2019. Just 25% of Swedes ...