China Boasts 4 Million on Internet
July 14, 1999
ASSOCIATED PRESS
BEIJING (AP) -- The number of Internet users in China hit 4 million in June, the state Xinhua News Agency said Wednesday in a report about the growth of on-line computer use.
Men make up 85 percent of the total, while 86 percent of Internet users have college degrees, the Xinhua report said, citing data from the state-run China Internet Network Information Center.
Twenty-five percent work in the computer industry, and a large proportion of users are young, well educated and urban, the report said.
The number of on-line computers is also growing, hitting 1.46 million in June, according to the report.
The report projected the number of Internet users in China would reach 5 to 8 million by the end of the year.
Over the past few years China's communist government has encouraged people to take advantage of on-line computers, yet it closely monitors how they are used.
Internet service providers are required to register customers with the government, and barriers have been installed to block access to sites deemed subversive or pornographic.
A computer entrepreneur in Shanghai was sentenced in January to two years in prison on subversion charges for giving Chinese e-mail addresses to a pro-democracy journal published on the Internet by dissidents abroad.
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