They might have grown up online — but Gen Z are apparently far less likely to use antivirus, study finds
A recent study found that Gen Z is less likely to use antivirus software, with only 27% of respondents using it for mobile devices. This is concerning given that 57% of Gen Z spends more time online than offline, and many have had devices, data, or online accounts attacked. The study highlights the need for Gen Z to prioritize online safety and cybersecurity, including regularly changing passwords and backing up important personal data.
- ▪Only 27% of Gen Z respondents use antivirus software for mobile devices.
- ▪57% of Gen Z spends more time online than offline, making them more vulnerable to cyber attacks.
- ▪Just 28% of Gen Z regularly backs up important personal data stored on their phones.
TechRadar publishes from United Kingdom and files mainly under tech. We currently carry 1,303 of its stories.
Story provenance
Source · retrieval · rights · ranking — open for full record
inspect →
Attribution is not the same as permission. This drawer separates discovery metadata, excerpts, WeSearch-generated summaries, reuse status, and whether the publisher receives the visit. Nothing here claims a legal grant the publisher has not made.
Record
| Original publisher | TechRadar |
| Canonical URL | https://www.techradar.com/pro/security/they-might-have-grown-up-online-but-gen-z-are-apparently-far-less-likely-to-use-antivirus-study-finds |
| Publication time | Wed, 29 Jul 2026 06:00:00 +0000 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-07-29T06:01:34.026Z |
| Last seen | 2026-07-29T06:01:34.026Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | aNyrhx40KVTh · 1 stories |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Pro Security They might have grown up online — but Gen Z are apparently far less likely to use antivirus, study finds News By Christian Cawley Published 29 July 2026 Gen Z needs the full lowdown on online safety When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works. (Image credit: Shutterstock) Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter Just 27% of Gen Z respondents use antivirus software for mobile devices, and are less likely to regularly change passwords57% of Gen Z spend more time online than offline, Kaspersky findsAnd only 28% regularly backup important personal data stored on…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at TechRadar.