US social media users sticking with services: survey

US adults appear to be sticking with Facebook, Twitter and other online platforms despite controversies over privacy and misinformation, according to a study released by the Pew Research Center.

A month-long survey taken early this year found that the portion of US adults who said they use various social media services was essentially unchanged from a year earlier, Pew said in a news release on Wednesday.

The results come in spite of "a long stretch of controversies over privacy, fake news and censorship on social media," Pew researchers Monica Anderson and Andrew Perrin said.

The percentages of people who said they used Facebook, Pinterest, LinkedIn or Twitter were "largely the same," with Instagram showing an uptick in its portion of users, according to the survey.

Facebook remained the most widely used social media website, with approximately seven out of every 10 adults saying they used the service.

"Facebook users as a whole are just as active on the site today as they were a ...