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La privacidad es un fenómeno social cuya descripción no ha recibido la atención que merece dada la creciente revelación y uso de información personal en relaciones privadas y públicas. A partir de una encuesta completada por 1650 individuos, este artículo investiga las variables que definen a quienes muestran una mayor preocupación por la privacidad en internet y a aquellos que siguen unos hábitos que permiten un mejor control de los datos que ceden. Tener antecedentes de problemas con la seguridad o de irritación por la invasión de la esfera privada es en ambos casos la variable más significativa. Está acompañada por otros factores relacionados con la actividad en internet y experiencia en su uso; las variables socioeconómicas o demográficas juegan un papel secundario.

This paper investigates the evolution of the telecommunications policy agenda by means of text mining forty years –from 1976 to 2016– of papers in the journal Telecommunications Policy. Text mining techniques help identify the key topics, the dominant combinations of concepts and the main areas of research within this multidisciplinary –technical, economic, social, policy– discipline. In addition they depict an evolution of the policy agenda more nuanced than the conventional public service, pre-competition and post-liberalisation stages typical of telecommunications. Also, in combination with bibliometric information, the results display the relationships between areas of research and methodologies, countries and authors’ background, all together providing a deeper understanding of the past, present and future avenues for research in telecommunications policy.

La politique adoptée par l'union européenne en matière de société de l’information s’initie avec le "livre blanc de Delors" et le "rapport de Bangemann" au début des années 1990. Durant cette première période et en dépit de quelques orientations sociales, c’est essentiellement la question de la libéralisation des télécommunications qui a été au centre des discussions. La situation a évolué quelque peu avec la mise en place du programme eEurope entre 2000 et 2005 à Lisbonne. L’année 2006 aurait pu annoncer, avec une nouvelle stratégie baptisée i2010, une montée en puissance de l’investissement de la commission européenne en matière de société de l’information. Il n’en est rien. Au contraire, on constate finalement une baisse des ambitions, un retour en arrière, faute de résultats probants de la stratégie de Lisbonne. The policy adopted by the European Union to boost the progress of the information society starts with the “Delors White Paper” and the “Bangemann Report”. During the first stage, and despite the supposedly social nuances, the liberalisation of telecommunications prevailed over any other aspect. A greater broad-mindedness, and thus more actions, came from the eEurope programme, developed during the first five years of the century. With the start of 2006, it has been replaced by a new strategy, baptised i2010. However, this is not the change that can prove most decisive. The vision of a Europe driven by its incorporation to the information society has been thinned down after the modification of the Lisbon strategy. This diversion of the course that had been taken in the past represents a worrying backward step, which is aggravated when considering the situation described in a not so encouraging preview of the results of eEurope.

A review of the literature on the relation between telecommunications and economic development published since the turn of this century is undertaken. Two stages have been considered: until 2008, most contributions continued to examine the role of telecommunications taken together; since 2009, the impact of broadband –and, to a lesser extent, of mobile communications– dominates the research agenda. All in all, the role of telecommunications as a catalyst to leverage economic growth has been conclusively proven over the years. Taking into consideration the shortcomings of previous research, suggestions for future work are also provided.

The literature on the relation between telecommunications and economic development published during the 20th century has been reviewed. It all began in 1963 with the publication of the Jipp curve. Over the twenty years that followed, there was hardly any noteworthy, at least academic, contribution. Already in the eighties, the debate was still focused towards the role of telecommunications in the integration of developing countries into the world economy. In the last decade of the century, subsequent research broadened the scope –the lack of an adequate telecommunication infrastructure is a serious drawback for any country–, and also made a qualitative and quantitative jump forward.

As interaction with digital providers has become a widespread practice, users are increasingly aware of the trade-off between anonymity and personalised and advantageous services. This contribution intends to ascertain whether a growing consciousness about how digital providers use personal data is having an impact in disclosure behaviour. It uses the theory of planned behaviour (TPB) and a representative survey of 1500 Internet users in Spain to test different hypotheses on how the knowledge of users about service providers usage of personal data influences privacy attitudes, intentions and disclosure behaviour. The analysis concludes that: (i) there is a direct link between privacy attitude and privacy behaviour in addition to the standard path mediated through intentions; (ii) as users become more tech savvy their behaviour regarding privacy is also enhanced except for the case of social networks, where knowledgeable individuals are less concerned; (iii) users are no longer naive on the effects of exchanging their data for an improved provision of digital services. As a general policy result the paper argues for increasing users’ awareness and knowledge as a means to encourage control of personal data.

In many cases, users of online applications and services consciously and willingly hand over personal data to obtain a better service or a price reduction. This action assumes –nominally – that they behaved rationally, estimating and comparing benefits and costs (the potential use of their data and to whom it might be given). People have different perceptions about the benefits that result from handing over personal data. This article investigates the factors that influence this differing perception and concludes that those who are addicted to the internet, whose confidence has not been damaged in the past, with less knowledge, and who are more active on the internet are prone to perceive a greater benefit.