Poor but networked: UN says cell phone use surging

More than half of the people in the developing world are now cell phone subscribers, a United Nations report said Tuesday, highlighting strong global growth in telecommunications. There were an estimated 4.6 billion mobile phone subscriptions at the end of last year, compared with about 1 billion in 2002, the International Telecommunication Union said in a report. In developing nations, 57 percent of people were signed up. "The rate of progress remains remarkable," the UN agency said. The report tallied cell phone, landline telephone and Internet usage in 159 countries, from the mainly European nations that are most advanced in information technology to those in sub-Saharan Africa that are the least developed.

Internet use has grown, but at a slower pace, the report said. An estimated 1.7 billion people, or 26 percent of the world's population, were online last year, up from 11 percent in 2002. Still, four out of five people living in poor countries had no access to the Internet, with China alone comprising a third of the people online in the developing world.