As life in Malaysia turns digital due to Covid-19, elderly may be left behind | Malay Mail

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 24 — Chin Lam, 67, has been a businessman for decades, and yet he said he finds it hard to trust online banking services.

“I don’t know how to book a Grab [ride] or order food. I have never done it before and don’t have the app either. Also, my phone isn’t that good, if I download too many apps there won't be enough space in it,” she said. Sritharan Vellasamy, founder and chief executive of Wordlabs Global Sdn Bhd — a company specialising in communications and consulting surrounding technology adaptation — said the situation is exacerbated as government agencies are helping drive more of our economy online, causing a “digital divide” between the young and the elderly.

Of the same view is Rachel Gong, a senior research associate at think tank Khazanah Research Institute focusing on digital policy, who said that despite indications that more senior citizens have adopted digital technology over the years, key problems still persist. Azrina Kamaruddin, an academic from Universiti Putra Malaysia’s Faculty of Computer Science and Information Technology said that the design of digital tools, such as websites and smartphone applications, are often themselves flawed and do not carefully consider how usable they are.

As of 2020, DoSM recorded that 10.7 per cent of the Malaysia population was made up of those aged 60 and above, amounting to some 3.5 million people. Meanwhile, more information and data on the pandemic and the lockdown from Ministry of Health and the National Security Council are made available on their websites, social media accounts, and through text messaging groups — not exactly intuitive for those unfamiliar.For Sritharan, the encouragement for the not-so-tech-savvy elderly to deal with situations such as this has to come from the government, as he urged for more digital education drives for the elderly.

Nonetheless, Gong said, it was more important to have systems and app designers think about how their products will be used and viewed by seniors, as not everyone can be asked to become a digital expert.

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