China Internet crowd grows by minute

BEIJING, July 19 (UPI) -- The number of Internet users in China hit an estimated 162 million by the end of June and the ongoing increase is huge, a report says.

Almost 100 people go on line for the first time every minute, the China Internet Network Information Center says.

An estimated 122 million Chinese have broadband access to the Internet. One in every four Chinese Internet users, or 44.3 million, accesses the Internet by phone, largely due to lower mobile charges, Xinhua, the government-run news service says.

With Internet penetration rate reaching 12.3 percent, China had around 9.18 million domain names, including 6.15 million ending with "cn," and 1.31 million Internet portals.

The Internet Center defines an "Internet user" as someone over the age of 6 who uses the Internet on average at least one hour per week.