A joint study by Kaspersky and the Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT) has found that parents’ self-confidence is the strongest predictor of whether they take active steps to protect their children’s privacy online — more so than awareness of the risks themselves.
The research, titled “Small Shares, Big Risks: How Parents Assess Threats and Cope with Sharing of Children’s Data,” surveyed 152 parents across nine countries in the APAC region and Egypt, including Singapore.
Confidence and Efficacy as Key Drivers
The study found that perceived self-efficacy — a parent’s confidence in their ability to manage digital risks — was the primary driver of protective behaviour. This includes actions such as adjusting privacy settings, restricting access to shared content, and preventing third parties from profiling children through publicly available data.
More than four in five respondents said they believed they could avoid sharing identifiable information such as birthdates or school names (85%), avoid posting potentially embarrassing images of their children (85%), and limit content access to family and close friends (84%).
Perceived response efficacy — the belief that protective measures actually work — was identified as the second strongest predictor of safe sharing behaviour. When parents trust that their actions make a difference, they are more likely to follow through consistently.
Age and Gender Also Shape Digital Behaviour
The research found that as parents age, they perceive fewer barriers to adopting privacy-protection measures. The perceived effort required to manage settings or switch to more secure platforms declines with experience, suggesting that digital literacy compounds over time.
Gender differences were also observed. Mothers demonstrated stronger intentions to protect children’s privacy, with higher coping appraisal scores indicating greater confidence in both the effectiveness of protective measures and their own ability to implement them.
“In general, as parents age, they gain more experience in parenting and become more perceptive to threats and vulnerabilities, both online and offline, leading to heightened proactiveness in responding and protecting,” said Trishia Octaviano, Senior Manager, Cybersecurity Education for Asia Pacific at Kaspersky.
The study was co-authored by Associate Professor Jiow Hee Jhee, Deputy Director of the Teaching and Learning Academy at SIT, and draws on responses gathered between October 2025 and February 2026.
