China Largest Number of Internet Users

The global number of internet users passed one billion in December with China overtaking America, according to research firm comScore.

The actual number of users is probably much higher as comScore's figures are based only on the number of internet users aged 15 and above working from home or work computers. They did not take into account traffic from public computers such as internet cafes or access from mobile phones.

The Asia-Pacific region accounted for 41 percent of the one billion global internet users, followed by Europe (28 percent), North America (18 percent), Latin America (seven percent) and the Middle East and Africa (five percent).

China had the largest population of internet users with nearly 180 million people going online in December, followed by the United States with 163 million, Japan with 60 million, Germany and Britain with nearly 37 million each and France with 34 million.

India was next with 32 million Internet users followed by Russia (29 million), Brazil (28 million), South Korea (27 million), Canada (22 million) and Italy (21 million).

"Surpassing one billion global users is a significant landmark in the history of the internet," comScore chief executive Magid Abraham said. "The second billion will be online before we know it, and the third billion will arrive even faster than that," he said.

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