Climate change, ISIS, cyberattacks top list of global threats: survey

Climate change, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) and cyberattacks lead a list of the most-feared global threats, according to a new survey.

The Pew Research Center study released Sunday found that respondents in 13 of 26 countries surveyed listed global climate change as a top international threat.

Respondents in eight nations named ISIS as a top threat, while those in the U.S., Japan, South Africa and the Netherlands pointed to cyberattacks from other countries.

{mosads}The survey found that global climate change is a rising concern. More than two-thirds — 67 percent — of the roughly 27,000 respondents questioned listed it as a major threat in this study, compared to 63 percent in 2017 and 56 percent in 2013.

Concerns about cyberattacks are also increasing, with 61 percent now calling it a threat, up from the 54 percent in 2017.

And while ISIS is still listed as a major concern, the amount of people worried about it dipped from 66 percent in 2017 to 62 percent.

Pollsters found political divides on climate change and ISIS, with Republicans and GOP-leaning respondents in the U.S. far less likely to list climate change as a threat than Democrats and Democratic-leaning individuals.

Right-leaning respondents were more worried about ISIS than individuals aligned with the left.

The Pew survey, conducted from May 14 to Aug. 12, 2018, has a margin of error of 2.9 percentage points.