Abstract

The growth of online transactions coincides with the rise of cyber-criminals’ intent on stealing con-sumers’ personal and financial data. This fosters fear of online identity theft (FOIT), which in turn may lead to changes in consumer behavior and negatively affect e-business performance. This re-search aims to identify empirically derived segments of FOIT-prone consumers. Using a large sample of online shoppers, four distinct clusters are identified—‘less fearful shoppers’, ‘strong fear but ignor-ing shoppers’, ‘fearless shoppers’, and ‘fearful shoppers’. The clusters differ significantly with respect to primary cluster variables as well as numerous secondary cluster variables. The relevance of FOIT for segmenting online consumers and theoretical implications for IS research are discussed.

Download

Share

COinS