Report: 70 percent of Koreans online
A report from Korea's Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) stated that there are over 30.67 million Internet users in Korea as of June this year, up from 29.22 million six months ago.
The recent spike means 68.2 percent of the nation's 45 million-strong population aged six and above are now online. The results were based on a bi-annual survey of 17,347 Korean residents from 7,030 households across the country by the MIC and the National Internet Development Agency.
On a demographic level, the study found that 95 percent of Koreans aged 6 to 29 years use the Internet regularly. This compares with 86.4 percent for those in their 30s, 58.3 percent for people in their 40s and around 27.6 percent for those aged 50 and above. The findings also showed that Internet usage stands at 74.4 percent among men and 62 percent among women.
MIC's findings further revealed Koreans spend an average of 11.5 hours a week on the Net, mainly to search for information, e-mail and play online games.
Korea is the fifth country in the world to cross the 30 millionth Internet user mark following the United States, China, Japan and Germany.
Seung eun Myung of ZDNet Korea reported from Seoul.