The Reality of Digital Exclusion Among Older Adults

The conversation around digital equity tends to focus on access. And there's a group whose digital exclusion may not come immediately to mind: older adults. As more aspects of daily life move online, the gap between what the digital world requires and what a lot of older adults are equipped to handle is more than a personal inconvenience. It has costs— in unrealized benefits, in strain on caregivers, and in lack of services for people who can't navigate the systems intended to help them.

More People Than You Might Expect

In the context of digital equity, "older adult," includes more than people 65 and up. The threshold is often 50 and above. That changes the scale of the problem.

If you weren't using the internet when it first became widely available, you probably never got on. And if you live somewhere where the internet arrived late — or still hasn't fully arrived — there was no real opportunity to build those skills, even if you wanted to.

The internet didn't automatically become part of the lives of everyone who’s now over 50. If it wasn't available where they lived, or wasn't part of how they worked, there was no reason to adopt it. And that gap has been growing ever since.

The Disconnect

The NDIA has indicated that there are five core pillars that impact digital inclusion:

• Affordable, robust broadband internet service
• Internet-enabled devices meeting user needs
• Access to digital literacy training
• Quality technical support
• Applications and content designed to encourage self-sufficiency

Many older adults are strong across all five areas. Some have enough to get by. Some struggle across the board. And the consequences show up in real life — getting taxes done, filing for Social Security benefits, making telehealth appointments during bad weather.

As more essential services move online, the stakes get higher. There's talk of moving banking online with no paper options. Federal and state benefits increasingly require online applications. 

If someone doesn’t have the five pillars in place, their ability to participate civically, in the economy, and socially is limited.

The Rural Factor: A Compounding Challenge

For older adults in rural areas, the challenges can stack up.

The most basic issue is whether broadband is even available. Even if you have the skills, it doesn't matter if you can't get online at home. And if your whole community didn't have access to reliable internet for years, there was no reason to adapt to using it.

For many people working on rural farms or ranches, the internet simply wasn't available for a long time. There was no opportunity to adapt, no reason to pick up those skills. And today, their grandkids are asking them, "Can you get on a video call? Did you get my email?" If the answer is ‘no’, it can quickly feel like you’re out of the loop.

The Fraud Problem

It’s well known that older adults are disproportionately vulnerable to internet scams. Even before the internet, older adults were more likely to be targeted through mailings and phone calls. Online, those risks are bigger and fast moving.

Someone who's just learning to navigate the digital world usually doesn’t have the instincts to recognize a phishing email or a suspicious link. They're dangerously exposed to scammers. Helping people build those instincts needs to be part of digital inclusion work, because it’s a real safety issue.

When the Interface Changes, Everything Falls Apart

One of the trickier dynamics in digital inclusion for older adults is the moving target problem. It's not just about learning — it's that what you've learned keeps changing.

A lot of the frustration our partners tell us about is what happens when software gets updated. Older adults will finally get comfortable with something, and then the interface changes. Everything moves around or gets reorganized. Even the very icon used to represent an app can update. That can be incredibly frustrating.

That's not a failure of intelligence or willingness. It's a design problem. Most interfaces are built by engineers who assume fluency from users. That assumption fails anyone lacking core digital skills, including older adults. It’s a problem that digital navigators assist with on a regular basis.

Digital Navigators and Caregivers Fill the Gaps

Libraries and digital equity-focused nonprofits are two resources that some  older adults turn to for help. Some libraries offer access and training for people who can get to them. Some nonprofits with digital equity programs meet people at senior centers or go into homes, sitting down one-on-one. These are programs that can only scale by adding more people and resources.

It’s very hands-on work. Some organizations send digital navigators to people's homes, connect everything, and get things running. That’s because many of the older people they serve aren't able to do it themselves due to inexperience or limited mobility. Digital navigators build real relationships with these people. Rapport and trust are required. You have to trust somebody to let them get on your computer.

And it's not just professional navigators doing this work. Family members — often younger relatives — and other caretakers get pulled into the role of de facto tech support. The more older adults can build digital confidence, the less that burden falls on the people around them.

That said, this work is more complicated than just tech support or digital skills training. Many organizations in the digital equity space have come to realize they need to offer both. A digital navigator might get a call from someone saying their internet doesn't work and they don’t know how to troubleshoot the problem. This requires both tech support and digital skills training that has to be customized for each person, their equipment, and their problem.

35 Mile's Approach: Service Through Inclusion

After everything we’ve said above, it might surprise you to know that we don't focus on older adults in our grants and partnerships. That's by design.

We focus on connecting low-income people to internet service by partnering with organizations that offer low-cost internet access and help people safely navigate online. By default, that includes a lot of older adults — many of whom rely on Social Security or have limited fixed income. Social Security income is one of the criteria for many of the people who benefit from our partners’ programs. We know that a significant portion of the people they reach are older adults.

There is often overlap with other groups that our partners serve. A siloed strategy would miss these people. Our goal is to fund organizations that meet people where they are, and for many of those organizations, older adults are included.

What Would Really Move the Needle

If funders in the digital equity sector could support anything to meaningfully shift the digital exclusion that older adults face, what would it look like?

For us, the answer is simple — multi-year programs that include four key elements: 

• Low-cost internet access
• Affordable internet-enabled devices
• Full-time digital navigators who earn a living wage
• Readily available tech support

A sustained commitment gives navigators enough stability to stay on the job, develop relationships, and work with more people. That would give them the time required to build the kind of trust that disappears when staff turns over. 

Currently, most digital equity funders are primarily supporting programs year-by-year — though there are some exceptions. If we, and other funders in the space, committed to funding these kinds of programs for longer stretches of time — and to paying digital navigators and nonprofit tech support staff a living wage — that could create a path to long-lasting impact.

Let’s be honest. The landscape is going to keep shifting. The advent of AI is just one aspect of upcoming change. In addition, in a March 13, 2018 article, the US Census Bureau predicts that by 2034, “...older adults will edge out children in population size: People age 65 and over are expected to number 77.0 million (previously 78.0 million), while children under age 18 will number 76.5 million (previously 76.7 million).” As a sector, we need to be proactive in ensuring that this fast-growing population doesn’t get overlooked when it comes to digital access.

We don't know all the ways support will be needed, or all the ways it might be delivered. What we can do is to fund and partner with more organizations that directly serve older adults who are being left behind — people who deserve to be connected to the services they need and the people they love.