Fears that older women may be locked out of online services as statistics reveal ‘silver surfer’ gender gap

A “SILVER surfer” gender gap has been revealed, as official data shows older women are much less likely to use the internet than their male counterparts.

Figures released by the Office for National Statistics showed that women over 75 were much less likely than men to have used the internet in the past three months.

The data shows that 51.3 per cent of men in this age group had done so, compared with only 37.6 per cent of women. Experts said the disparity was likely to be the result of work trends among older people.

James Richardson, a research manager at the Good Things Foundation, which teaches digital skills, said: “One reason might be that among the age cohort that’s currently over 75, men were more likely to have workplace experience of digital than women, just because at that time they were more likely to have the higher-skilled jobs where digital was likely to be something that was required of them.”

More research was required to establish whether or not women were being disadvantaged by not accessing the internet, he said.

“Even workplace experience doesn’t give people the confidence, the motivation or the sense of perceived value in technology that they need to become independent users,” he said.

“Older women are more likely to report loneliness than older men but I don’t think that’s because of their usage of digital, I think it’s because they’re more likely to live longer.”

Mr Richardson said that, contrary to popular belief, many older people were not rejecting the internet through “fear” or “misunderstanding”, but they were “simply able to meet their needs through offline means, whether through friends or family, the fact that they were still able to drive, or had good health”.

Some efforts to get older people online could “come on too strong”, he added, and alienate older people by implying that they had no choice but to use the internet.

Older people’s groups warned that businesses and government should ensure services were still available to older people who did not go online. Jemma Mouland, of the Centre for Ageing Better, said: “Digital by default makes sense for much of society, but in the drive for efficiency we must not lose sight of the reality that some people won’t ever go online or will have limited ability to use the internet.

“Companies, government and services who are moving operations online need to ensure that these people don’t get locked out of access to information and essential services such as banking, health information, booking appointments or paying bills.”