"The digital revolution is driving concerns among New Zealanders," Ms Shroff said.
"The survey shows that people are increasingly conscious of privacy while they're engaging online, so there are some lessons in here particularly for the internet corporate giants."
Ms Shroff said the 55 per cent of New Zealanders who Facebook is a "private space" were naive.
"Facebook itself, and sometimes its business partners, may be able to use the information you put up there for their own needs.
"There's no such thing as a free lunch - our information is the product that the internet giants are using. So it is slightly risky to assume a social media site is private."
More than three-fifths of respondents said they were uncomfortable with Facebook and Google keeping information on what they have said or done online.
Last year, Facebook's tracking technology landed the social networker in hot water after an Australian blogger published data showing it gathered information on the online activities of users.
In response, Facebook promised to fix a "bug" which meant logged-out users could be identified as they visited many other sites on the web.
Netsafe's chief technology officer, Sean Lyons, said even the amount of information people voluntarily gave Facebook meant targeted marketing would occur.
"If you think about the amount of information that Facebook has - I like this, I've been here, I've travelled to this place, these are my friends - there's an awful lot of information right there.
"We use a product like Facebook that we don't pay for ... it makes its money from advertising, from sharing with other people the information that you chose to share with it."
