LEGAZPI CITY, Philippines – Paz Deocariza, 67, has been utilizing a cell phone for about two years now. She commonly makes use of Fb Messenger to speak along with her eldest daughter, who’s at present working in Saudi Arabia, and along with her grandchildren, who’re learning in Albay.
She additionally makes use of her telephone to entertain herself via social media platforms like YouTube and Fb.
Certainly one of roughly 1.5 million aged Filipinos who’re registered within the Division of Info and Communications Know-how (DICT) database, Paz is perhaps thought-about a digital success story for her technology. She is likely one of the fortunate seniors whose lives have improved due to fashionable expertise.
In a rustic the place a lot of day by day life has shifted on-line, nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of those older Filipinos are being left behind. A 2021 research by the Philippine Institute for Growth Research (PIDS) discovered that solely 18% of Filipinos aged 65 and older have a minimum of one primary info and communication expertise (ICT) talent, equivalent to utilizing e mail, sending textual content messages, or looking the online.
In Paz’s case, it was her household that was instrumental in serving to her bridge the digital hole. A resident of Barangay Pating, Masbate Metropolis, she used to stay with two granddaughters whom she raised like they had been her personal youngsters.
However each at the moment are in school within the neighboring province of Albay. Since then, expertise has change into each a lifeline and a problem for her.
Private longing, nationwide downside
Not all seniors have entry to expertise as a lot as Paz does. For hundreds of thousands of Filipino senior residents, the conveniences introduced by devices and the web solely exist in tales advised by the youthful technology — a distant, nearly overseas actuality.
In a small hut in Barangay Burgos, Daraga, Albay, sisters Honorina and Virginia Lodor stay surrounded by towering coconut timber and the fixed hum of crickets. Their house sits removed from the city heart.
Their one connection to the surface world is a small transistor radio, its plastic casing worn skinny, crackling with static because it picks up AM information and the occasional native music station. This little factor is their solely supply of data and type of leisure.
For Honorina, having a cellphone would have meant with the ability to contact their siblings who’re in Manila. It will even have turn out to be useful at any time when they wanted to get assist.
As an illustration, Honorina recalled, a big snake as soon as entered their hut, and so they needed to run from their home to their nearest neighbor simply to ask for assist. Due to their age, operating a sure distance is now not a straightforward process.
If that they had a telephone, Honorina stated, they may have simply referred to as as an alternative of going via all this hassle. “Ayos man kuta kung could cellphone ta maga-angal ka na sana, di na magparaagi,” she defined. (It will be higher if we had a telephone so we might simply name as an alternative of going to locations instantly.)
There have been additionally situations after they had been required to fill out on-line varieties, so that they needed to ask their neighbors’ children to do it for them as a result of they didn’t have a tool to make use of and even an web connection.
However actuality is harsh. The sisters make a residing by promoting copra, the dried type of coconut meat used for oil manufacturing. It’s seasonal work that pays little, barely sufficient to cowl their day by day meals and primary wants. And though they’re incomes from this, they nonetheless must pay for the employees who assist them produce the copra.
In a family with solely two seniors making an attempt to outlive, there is no such thing as a room for an web connection of their day-to-day priorities.
Reluctant seniors
A research on Filipino seniors’ smartphone use printed within the Worldwide Federation for House Economics, discovered that whereas the Filipino aged know the significance of utilizing smartphones for communication, they “will not be very ” of their distinctive options, equivalent to utilizing apps, which they discover difficult.
Except for name and textual content messaging, the research famous, it’s uncommon for seniors to make use of different options of smartphones. Usually, their use of the gadget is proscribed to the fundamental options of cellphones. Seniors additionally discover it difficult to sort textual content utilizing digital keypads.
Some seniors are reluctant to navigate the digital world altogether.
This was the case for Honorina’s sister, 78-year-old Virginia. She is 16 years older than Honorina, and for her, studying easy methods to use a cell phone is an pointless burden.
“Kung ako, habo ko na kaan na mga cellphone yan ta maluya na ngani ang mata ko, pati pandungog ko maluya na man,” she stated. (Personally, I don’t actually need to have issues like a cellphone as a result of my eyesight and my listening to are already weak.)
Virginia handed away only a few weeks after the interview with Rappler.
In Paz Deocariza’s case, the will to attach with household motivated her to bridge this hole.
Mikaila, one among her grandchildren, shared that her grandmother wasn’t utilizing social media but throughout her first 12 months in school. It’s a lot simpler now, Mikaila stated, to achieve her grandmother if there are emergencies. Up to now, they used to relay messages via different kinfolk.
Susceptible offline and on-line
The DICT has repeatedly warned that as extra authorities transactions transfer on-line — from pension distributions to tax funds — digitally illiterate seniors danger being excluded solely.
In rural Bicol, the place poverty charges are increased than the nationwide common, the lack to purchase devices or pay for web entry additional deepens this exclusion. Regardless of this, the digital literacy of senior residents within the nation stays a serious downside.
However entry shouldn’t be the one subject.
Once they do go surfing, digital illiteracy additionally makes seniors prime targets for on-line scams. Fraudsters exploit their unfamiliarity with social media.
In a roadshow with Rappler held on the Far Jap College on September 16, 2025, Renato Paraiso, government director of the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Middle (CICC), shared that scammers typically goal senior residents due to their belief in different folks, low digital literacy, and the truth that they’re normally unaware of the brand new rip-off ways.
He additionally emphasised that isolation and loneliness make seniors extra prone to emotional manipulation, particularly in romance and funding scams.
“Cash isn’t the one factor that they lose, additionally they lose their belief in themselves and their sense of safety,” Paraiso stated in Filipino, explaining the results of scams on victims.
In 2021, the Nationwide Bureau of Investigation (NBI) reported that scammers took anyplace between P1 million and P17 million from their victims.
Focused by on-line scammers
Information collected by the CICC signifies that a lot of the rip-off circumstances are from NCR and Area 4A. There have been 282 recorded circumstances the place seniors had been victimized, most of whom are round 60 to 69 years outdated and are energetic on-line.
The frequent scams that concentrate on seniors are phishing, funding scams, love scams, lottery scams, and well being product fraud. Some of the notable circumstances that Paraiso remembered was a business rip-off that he encountered when he was nonetheless with DICT.
“One of many grandmothers, as a result of she didn’t know what she was going via, gave her OTPs till the scammers acquired all of her monetary information. I feel each her financial savings and retirement pay had been taken,” he share in Filipino.
An NBI consultant from Area V who refused to be named stated in an interview with Rappler that senior residents ought to take precautionary measures towards scams concentrating on them.
“Really, these scammers actually look into the profiles of the senior residents as a result of they suppose that they’re simpler to idiot,” the consultant stated in Filipino.
He suggested seniors to be vigilant towards these “too good to be true” affords that they see on-line, as a result of most frequently than not, these are the handiwork of fraudsters. That is significantly true when these persons are already asking for cash.
Paz Deocariza stated that she encounters fraud like this day by day. For instance, one put up by a pretend social media web page of an influencer says in its caption that they’re giving cash to fortunate winners who will touch upon their put up. She would consider this and ask within the remark part how she will win.
Luckily, her household would warn her that posts like this will not be true, so she doesn’t fall for them anymore.
The issue is that not all seniors stay with their relations who can information them about scams and fraud.
A lifeline, not an possibility
The PIDS report, which makes use of United Nations Sustainable Growth Purpose indicators, warns that the “digital divide” within the Philippines isn’t just a matter of comfort; it’s turning into a matter of survival. From on-line banking and telemedicine to easily checking climate alerts, increasingly important providers have gotten accessible solely via smartphones and the web.
“Digital literacy is now not optionally available — it’s a lifeline,” the report confused.
In an interview with Rappler, Mary Jean Loreche, chairperson of the Nationwide Fee of Senior Residents (NCSC), stated their workplace has been conducting advocacy applications, coaching, and seminars about digital literacy to coach seniors in regards to the correct use of expertise, together with the utilization of social media and the avoidance of on-line scams.
She stated that one of many main challenges their applications faces is easy methods to maintain the aged engaged. “Possibly, [this can be done] by offering areas or cubicles in malls, educational establishments, or anyplace [where there is an] web connection for them to be taught,” she added.
To guard seniors from on-line scams, Loreche additionally stated that they’ve shaped a relationship with the Nationwide Privateness Fee to create applications that can educate the aged about cybersecurity.
The digital revolution guarantees alternative and connection, however till digital literacy turns into widespread and connectivity reasonably priced, many Filipino seniors will stay on the sidelines, watching the world velocity previous. – Rappler.com
Hershey Juan is a fourth-year journalism scholar at Bicol College. An Aries Rufo Journalism Fellow of Rappler for 2025, she can be a public relations employees member of the Bicol Universitarian.
