Due to the high frequency with which people use computers and search engines to access information and answers to the queries they face on a daily basis, the human memory system is being severely weakened. 
This “digital amnesia” epidemic, if you will, was studied by cybersecurity firm Kaspersky Lab. It examined the memory habits of some 6,000 adults across several different countries, including the UK, France, and Germany. Among their findings, more than one-third admitted that they turn first to computers to recall information, and more than half of the respondents in the UK admitted to turning to search engines first, in order to accurately address a query.
The study suggests that relying on computers this way has a negative, long-term impact on the development of the memory system; this is due to the fact that such easily accessible information is often very quickly forgotten.
“Our brain appears to strengthen a memory each time we recall it, and at the same time forget irrelevant memories that are distracting us,” said Dr. Maria Wimber from the University of Birmingham. She went on to point out that the act of passively repeating information like, say, Googling the significance of various points of interest while on vacation, do not create lasting memories; that is, a year from now you will remember going to the Hoover Dam, but you’ll forget that while you were there, a Google search on the Hoover Dam told you that it was built between 1931 and 1936.
“In contrast, passively repeating information, such as repeatedly looking it up on the internet, does not create a solid, lasting memory trace in the same way,” Dr. Wimber explains.
Other data compiled from the study: of the adults surveyed in the UK, 45% could recall their home phone number from the age of 10 years old, 43% could remember their current work phone number, and 29% could remember their own children’s phone numbers. Also, of this sample group, 51% could recall their partner’s phone number.
The study goes on to suggest that people today are much more accustomed to using computer devices as an extension of their own brain, and that the resulting digital amnesia affect is due to an individual’s willingness, albeit unconscious to an extent, to forget important information because it can be immediately retrieved from their device. It details how there is now a trend to keep personal memories in digital form, along with factual information on where and when the images were captured. 
According to Dr. Wimber, this is only worsening the epidemic.
“There also seems to be a risk that the constant recording of information on digital devices makes us less likely to commit this information to long-term memory, and might even distract us from properly encoding an event as it happens,” she concluded.
Via BBC
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