MANILA – For most people, the thought of losing a phone is more distressing than the prospect of a breakup.

A study conducted for security software firm Kaspersky Lab made participants rate “most distressing incidents.”

Only a family member’s illness was able to beat out losing a phone and the inability to retrieve digital photos, which ranked second and third in the list, respectively.

Breakups were only considered the fourth “most distressing” incident, followed by a hacked social media account, the loss of digital contacts, a quarrel with a friend, family member or partner, a car accident where no one got hurt, a bad day at work, and a pet’s illness.

Despite people’s attachment to their digital memories, the study also showed that people are willing to give their photos and other personal details away for as little as $11.11 or around P553.72.

“The experiment showed us interesting and reflective results: while people believe that they understand the value of their data, the emotional value isn’t reflected in their everyday actions. On the one hand, people seem to be aware of the types of data that are more important to them – they believe their digital memories, such as photos, are extremely distressing to lose,” said Andrei Mochola, head of consumer business at Kaspersky Lab.

“On the other hand, people have a low awareness of the value of their data and are putting little monetary value against their data as a result. They know it’s emotionally important, but they are not able to appreciate its value yet. They would need someone to actively remind them of what their data is worth before they share it, or allow someone to delete it,” Mochola added.

Kaspersky Lab’s study included an online survey by research firm Toluna of 16,250 female and male users aged over 16 years old from 17 countries, and two behavioral analysis experiments by the University of Wuerzburg in Germany.

The Philippines was not included in the study.