Report: China has more Web users than US has citizens

The number of Internet users in China is now greater than the entire population of the United States, after rising to 338 million by the end of June, state media reported Sunday.

China’s online population, the largest in the world, rose by 40 million in the first six months of 2009, the official Xinhua news agency reported, citing a report by the China Internet Network Information Center.

The number of broadband Internet connections rose by 10 million to 93.5 million in the first half of the year, the report said.

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, citing the official data.