Chinese state media said on Sunday that after rising to 338 million by the end of June, the number of Internet users in China is now greater than the entire population of the United States, AFP reported.
The official Xinhua news agency cited a report by the China Internet Network Information Center that the entire country’s online population grew by 40 million in the first six months of 2009.
The report said that in the first half of the year the number of broadband Internet connections rose by 10 million to 93.5 million.
Official data showed that about 95 percent of townships were connected to broadband by early June and 92.5 percent of villages had telephone lines that could be used for Internet access, Xinhua said.
China Mobile vice president Lu Xiangdong was quoted last week as saying that when the country's three telecoms operators, China Telecom, China Mobile and China Unicom invest $40 billion in a national 3G network over the next year, rural coverage is expected to improve even more.
The Internet has become a forum for China's fast-growing online population to express their opinions in a way rarely seen in the traditional, strictly government-controlled media.
The government has even increased its control over Internet usage in recent years as the growing strength and influence of the web population has prompted concern in Beijing about potential social unrest.
In one of the largest known Internet blackouts in China, the government cut off online access to most of the northwest Xinjiang region after rioting in the capital earlier this month.
Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and a range of other sites used for networking and sharing content were also blocked from being used.
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