India net growth 17%
By Bala Shah

ComScore, Inc is a global leader in measuring the digital world and is reliably quoted by most international media and tech business. Comscore has just released a report titled ‘China, India and Japan Fuel Rapid Growth in Asia Pacific Internet Audience’

The study found that the Asia-Pacific region has seen significant growth in the past year, increasing 22 percent to nearly half a billion visitors to Internet sites, with most individual countries in the region experiencing double-digit growth rates.

In September 2009, the Internet population in the Asia-Pacific region reached 484 million visitors age 15+ that accessed the Internet from a home or work location, an increase of 22 percent from the previous year. With nearly half a billion people online, the region now accounts for 41 percent of the total 1.2 billion person global Internet audience. China, home to the largest Internet population in the world, experienced a 31-percent increase to 220.8 million, making it the fastest-growing Internet country in the region. Japan saw its online population surge 18 percent to 68.3 million, while India climbed 17 percent to 35.8 million users.

While this comScore study does give us a good idea about the status quo, it missed out on surveying internet cafes which are used by millions of Indians every day. There are other surveys which put the Indian internet users at 50 million plus.