The State of Digital Trust 2026 report, based on a survey of 11,000 consumers across seven markets conducted by Sapio Research in March 2026, documents a UK market moving from passive concern to active data management.
Ninety-two percent of consumers say they have taken steps to protect their personal data online in the past six months. Forty-three percent have rejected cookies on websites. Forty-five percent say they now click 'accept all' less often than three years ago. Privacy rights awareness has improved more in the UK than in any other market surveyed, with the proportion of consumers unaware of their rights falling from 50% to 43% over the past year.
The tension sits in the gap between action and understanding. Despite taking protective steps, 41% of UK consumers say they do not have a good understanding of how companies collect and use their personal information.
AI is sharpening that tension. Among UK respondents, 61% say they are uncomfortable with their personal data being used to train AI models. Almost a quarter (24%) have avoided trying a new product or service because of concerns about how a company uses AI; 23% have stopped purchasing from a brand for the same reason.
The commercial stakes run in both directions. More than half (56%) of UK consumers have already stopped using a company's services because of data privacy concerns. And 50% say they would pay more for a product or service from a company that is transparent about how it uses AI and personal data.
"Consumers are making purchasing decisions based on how brands handle their data, and over half are willing to pay more to the ones that get it right," said Tilman Harmeling, Strategy and Market Intelligence at Usercentrics. "The brands that move first won't just earn the premium. They'll earn a category position that's almost impossible to compete against once it's established."
Usercentrics provides consent management and AI data governance infrastructure, so the company has a commercial interest in the story it is telling. The survey methodology — 2,000 UK respondents from a broader 11,000-person study across seven markets — appears consistent with standard market research practice.
To stay across the latest in cloud, AI and enterprise tech analysis from Compare the Cloud, subscribe to our weekly newsletter at https://www.comparethecloud.net/newsletter
