Digital trust – asystematic literature review

Abstract

Digital technologies, such as social networks, smartphones, block chains or big data, have become an indispensable part of our lives in recent years. They have a significant impact on our daily lives, even in crucial areas such as health, finance, and education. Recognising this, organisations presently face a difficult challenge – to create consumer digital trust. It should be noted that most studies have focused on the establishment of digital trust without identifying and considering the basic definition of “digital trust”. The purpose of this article is to provide insights regarding the state of the art of digital trust, and to suggest areas for future research. Using a systematic literature review, this paper provides an overview of the literature. The most important conclusion to be derived from this study is that there is no single generally accepted definition of digital trust. Although the early research on “digital trust” can be traced back to 1996, it was only after 2016 that the number of papers on this topic increased substantially.