Information technology is emerging as a pivotal driving force for the advancement of the digital economy, the evolution towards a smart society, and the enhancement of social production efficiency. With rapid progress in information technology, people's diverse information behaviours are also witnessing simultaneous growth, however, there is an increasingly serious issue of illicit access to citizens' personal information through misuse of inadequate information and visual deception. The vulnerability of college students to information leakage has become a prominent concern in society due to their limited worldly experience and extensive utilization across various domains. In this study, we focus on college students as our starting point to explore social information security behaviour and contemplate strategies for effectively safeguarding data privacy through responsible conduct. Employing protection motivation theory as our theoretical framework and utilizing literature analysis, quantitative analysis, and questionnaire surveys with 303 participants, we conduct empirical research. The findings reveal positive correlations between perceived threat, self-efficacy, reaction effectiveness, and college students' adherence to information security practices while demonstrating that reaction cost significantly impedes such behaviour by exhibiting a negative correlation with it. Furthermore, recommendations are proposed regarding how educational institutions, media and online platforms can reinforce personal data protection measures so as to enhance college students' ability to mitigate risks associated with compromised data privacy.
 

protection motivation theory, information security behaviour, information security