Reasons for Not Using the Internet

Internet non-users are far from a homogeneous group. To better understand the reasons for remaining offline this year’s report further subdivides the “far” and “near user” typologies presented in previous editions into four distinct segments. The four segments of the Internet Non-user Segmentation are as follows:

NEAR USERS

New near users: — 12 per cent of Internet non-users Non-users who have never used the Internet before, but report they expect to begin using the Internet in the next year.

Rejoining/accelerating near users: — 12 per cent of Internet non-users Non-users who have used the Internet before and who expect to start using the Internet more regularly in the next year.

FAR USERS

Drop-out/infrequent users: — 16 per cent of Internet non-users Non-users who have used the Internet before, but do not expect to start using the Internet, or begin using the Internet more regularly, in the next year.

Core non-users: — 60 per cent of Internet non-users Non-users who have never used the Internet before and who do not expect to start using the Internet in the next year.

The distribution of these segments varies significantly across key subgroups:

• Only 8 per cent of senior non-users are “re-joining/accelerating near users” (4 per cent) or “drop-out/infrequent users” (4 per cent). And while 80 per cent are core-none users, at 12 per cent seniors are no more or less likely than other age groups to be “new near users”.
• Similarly, lowest income (less than $20K) non-users are less likely to be “re-joining/accelerating near users” or “drop-out/infrequent users” (8 per cent and 12 per cent) and are significantly more likely to be “core non-users” (68 per cent). At the same time, lowest income non-users have an average proportion of “new near users” (12 per cent).