Factors driving the acceptance of COVID-19 pandemic mobile contact tracing apps: The influence of security and privacy concerns

Abstract

The acceptance of COVID-19 mobile contact tracing apps (MCTA) is crucial to curb the spread of the virus and decrease the number of infections. However, the security and privacy concerns (SPC) of COVID-19 MCTA have been called into question. Thus this paper examines the drivers of the acceptance of the COVID-19 pandemic MCTA under the auspices of the influence of SPC from the Chinese perspective based on the modified Unified Theory of Acceptance and Usage of Technology (UTAUT) model. The data generated through a questionnaire based on the convenient sampling technique was analyzed with SPSS by performing hierarchical regression analysis. The results show that the core constructs of UTAUT such as performance expectancy (PE), facilitating conditions (FC), effort expectancy (EE), and social influence (SI) along with mobile self-efficacy (MSE) were significant predictors of individual user acceptance of COVID-19 MCTA. Additionally, the study confirmed that security and privacy concerns were significant in moderating the impact of PE, FC, EE, SI, and MSE on the acceptance of COVID-19 MCTA. The managerial and theoretical implications of these findings for policy-makers, governments, mobile app developers, and researchers are interrogated.

Keywords

• Public health
• COVID-19 pandemic
• Mobile contact tracing apps (MCTA)
• China
• Security and privacy concerns (SPC)
• UTAUT