Most Frequently Accessed Information Media by the Public

In the digital era, the internet has become a dominant source of information. According to the 2021 Digital Literacy Status survey conducted by the Katadata Insight Center (KIC) and the Ministry of Communication and Informatics (Kominfo), 73 percent of the population primarily seeks information through social media.

This finding is consistent with the previous year, where 73 percent of the population also primarily sought information on social media. Television ranked second as the most frequently accessed information medium, with 59.7 percent of respondents utilizing it most often.

While social media is the most accessed medium, it is not the most trusted source of information. The survey revealed that only 22.4 percent of respondents considered social media the most trustworthy source of information. The public, in fact, most trusts television as an information source, with 47 percent of respondents indicating this preference.

Based on this pattern, it's evident that the most accessed media is not necessarily the most trusted, and vice versa. Caution is needed in filtering information and identifying hoaxes, especially on social media, the most widely accessed information medium.

In terms of information media usage frequency, online news ranked third (26.7 percent), followed by official government websites (13.9 percent), print media (4 percent), and radio (4 percent). Furthermore, 1.2 percent of respondents did not access the internet at all.

Compared to the previous year, there was a decrease in the proportion of the population primarily accessing information from print media. A decrease of 5.7 percent was recorded, from 9.7 percent in 2020 to 4 percent in 2021. This change is also driven by the increasingly developed digital era.

Conversely, the proportion of people primarily accessing social media decreased from 76 percent in 2020 to 73 percent in 2021. Despite a slight decrease, social media remained the top-ranked medium for two consecutive years.

The most accessed social media platforms were WhatsApp (95.9 percent), Facebook (80.4 percent), YouTube (72.2 percent), Instagram (46.4 percent), TikTok (29.8 percent), Telegram (15.9 percent), Twitter (8.9 percent), and Line (4.5 percent).

The 2021 Digital Literacy Survey illustrates general internet usage and the state of digital literacy among the Indonesian population. The survey comprised a total of 10,000 national respondents, with the sample determined by household members aged 13-70 who accessed the internet within the last three months.