Number of Azerbaijani Internet users jump
By Rashid Shirinov
Azerbaijan became the 58th country in the world over number of its Internet users. Statistical project Internet Live Stats notes that the number of Azerbaijani Internet users has exceeded 6 million, accounting for 61.1 percent of the country’s population.
The figure increased by 1.2 percent or approximately 72,000 people compared to the 2015 data.
Having 721 million users, China heads the ranking. The second place holder is India (462 million), while the U.S. is third (287 million).
As for the CIS countries, the highest rate belongs to Russia, where 102 million people have access to the World Wide Web. It is followed by Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Belarus. The rest CIS countries did not manage to enter the Top-100.
In general, around 43 percent of the current world population has access to the worldwide network. However, the Internet is only available for 35 percent of the population in developing countries.
Overall, about four billion people worldwide still lack access to the Internet. The lowest levels are in Africa, south of the Sahara. For instance, in Guinea Internet is available to less than two percent of the population.
Access to the Internet in Azerbaijan is growing through the support of a national strategy to develop the country into an information and communication technology (ICT) hub in the Caucasus region. The Azerbaijani government actively seeks for foreign partners to boost the IT sector of the country.
The country has recently started the use of 4G Internet service which is considered to be a brand-new technology in the system of mobile telephone network and creates an opportunity for the access to the high-speed Internet all over the country. The signal of the digital broadcasting covers approximately 99 percent of Azerbaijan.
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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov
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