More than one in four American users have deleted Facebook, Pew survey finds

A new survey by the Pew Research Centre found that more than 1 in 4 American users have deleted the Facebook app from their phones in the past year. Photo / Washington Post

Nearly three-quarters of American Facebook users have changed how they use the social media app in the past year, following a barrage of scandals involving the abuse of personal data, foreign interference in US elections and the spread of hateful or harassing content on the platform.

The findings were released today in a new survey by the Pew Research Centre the same day that Facebook chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg is testifying before a Senate panel hearing to discuss how the company is combating foreign interference on the platform similar to Russian-tied efforts seen during the 2016 election.

The survey revealed that 74 per cent of US adult Facebook users have taken one of the following actions: changed their privacy settings, taken a break from the app or deleted it all together.

Pew found that more than one in four Americans have deleted the app from their phones. Fifty-four percent tweaked their privacy settings, and 42 per cent stopped using the app for several weeks or longer.

Those interventions were also much more likely to have been taken by younger people, who outpaced older users in each of the three actions. For instance, 64 per cent of 18-to-29 year-olds changed their privacy settings in the past year, compared with 33 per cent of people aged 65 and older.

Pew conducted the research between May 29 and June 11, surveying 4594 people.

Facebook said that users manage their information through the app's privacy controls every day. "Over recent months we have made our policies clearer, our privacy settings easier to find and introduced better tools for people to access, download, and delete their information. We've also run education campaigns on and off Facebook to help people around the world better understand how to manage their information on Facebook."

While the survey suggests large portions of Americans are abandoning the platform or scaling back their usage, Facebook reported stable daily active user numbers in its most recent earnings report.

Analysts have said, however, that the company may face challenges in acquiring new users in mature markets such as the United States and Europe. Facebook said that 185 million users are on the platform in the United States and Canada every day, unchanged from last quarter. Most of Facebook's user growth now comes from Asia.