Chinese Internet Population Jumped 23.4% in 2006

Press Release - January 29, 2007

China’s internet population will likely surpass that of the United States within the next two years, according to a news report this week.

The number of internet users in China increased by 23.4% last year to reach 137 billion, or 10% of the Asian country’s total population, according to the China Internet Network Information Center.

“We believe it will take two years at most for China to overtake the United States,” commented Wang Enhai, an official with the government-controlled agency. The U.S. currently has an online population of around 210 million.

In recent years, China’s communist government has encouraged citizens to use the internet for both education and commercial endeavors, while strictly regulating content it views as obscene or politically unacceptable. Dozens of Chinese bloggers and journalists have been jailed in recent years for distributing politically charged essays and articles over the web.