Commentary

Over A Third Of People Regularly Snoop On Partners' Mobile Devices

Women be snoopin’! (But men, too). Roughly half (44%) of British women admitted to regularly checking their partner’s mobile device in order to make sure they aren’t up to anything naughty, according to a new survey of 2,000 British adults by Samsung. Meanwhile, 36% of British men admit to doing the same thing.

Among those who snoop, six out of 10 have actually found something incriminating, while 44% have been caught in the act of snooping.

Overall, half of respondents said they have monitored their partner’s mobile device in at least one past relationship, and 16% said they do it in every relationship. Snooping on mobile devices is easier for some suspicious types, as 34% said they know their partner’s mobile PIN, 39% said they know their email password, and 26% said they know their Facebook password.

On a somewhat creepy note, over half of the respondents in the Samsung survey said they think that giving your PINs and passwords to your beloved is a sign of real commitment. Because as we all know from Hallmark greeting cards, if you really love someone, you submit yourself to their surveillance. Awww, sweet!

So what are those nosy Brits checking up on? The most popular communications for snooping were text messages, call history, private messages on Facebook and emails. Further down the list were photo galleries, Internet history, WhatsApp history and private Twitter messages.

Inevitably all that snooping must be delivering the coup de grace to a good number of relationships. Separately, a new survey of 1,094 U.S. adults conducted by YouGov for Listen, a mobile app, found that 28% would break up over the phone, while fewer than one in five would break up via text message (ouch!). Only 6% would break up via a message on Facebook or Twitter.

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