Internet Use Rate over 70% in South Korea -
Internet Use Rate 70.2%, Internet Users 31.58 millions
February 24, 2005
'Survey on the Computer and Internet Usage' conducted by NIDA(National
Internet Development Agency of Korea) in Dec. 2004 shows that
31.58 millions people are currently Internet Users, 70.2% of
total populations. (Sampling error : ¡À0.67%, 95% confidential
level)
As of December 2004, 70.2%(31.58 millions) of all Koreans age
6 or over use the wired or wireless Internet once or more in
the last month. The percentage of Internet users has increased
by 4.7%p (2.36 millions) since December 2003, and 2.0%p(0.91
millions) since June 2004.
For the Internet use rate by gender, 75.9% of all males(17.06million)
and 64.6% of all females (14.52million) use the Internet, which
shows that males' use rate is higher than females' by 1.3% (2.54million).
The component ratio of Internet users by gender is 54.0% for
males, 46.0% for females relieving 0.8%p of divide compared
to last survey in December 2004.
For the Internet use rate by age, Internet use rate among ages
6 to 19 is the highest with 96.2%, followed by 95.3% for 20's,
88.1% for 30's. The Internet use rate of 40's has increased
substantially by 10.9%p since the previous year. Main activities
online are showing big differences by age group. 'Learning'
is a main activity relatively for people ages 6 to 19, rather
than other age's group, 'Internet purchasing/reservation' and
'online banking' for 20's~30's, 'Reading news online newspapers
or magazine' for 40's~50's.
For the Internet use rate by occupations, Internet use rate
of students is the highest with 98.1%, followed by professional/managers(95.5%),
white-collars(94.3%). The percentage of Internet users among
house wives reaches 54.7%, and that of Internet users among
workers in production is the lowest with 37.7%.
70.7% of Internet users connect to the Internet mainly for
'search for data /information', and 53.6% for 'game' followed
by 'e-mail'(30.2%), 'entertainment'(20.8%), 'chatting/messenger'
(17.6%) and 'shopping/
reservation'(15.2%). 86.7% of Internet users have one or more
e-mail accounts and 2.0 active e-mail accounts on average which
they use at least once a month. 41.7% of Internet users also
use the Instant messenger for 6.3 hours per week on average.
Therefore, the Internet becomes a general communication tool.
For the Internet using patterns of e-commerce, 47.3% of Internet
users age 12 or over have bought goods/services online and 31.6%
of them have used Internet banking service. Moreover, 58.2%
of shareholders/ investors have used the Internet for stock
trading or investment, which means that the Internet is one
of the essential tools for economic transactions.
Penetration of Internet use and its stabilization in communities
and our social lives are resulted from Informatization opportunities
promoted nation-wide by the government to narrow the digital-divide.
Futhermore, the Korean government has plan to maintain the IT
training program for the digital-deprived and to realize an
ubiquitous society participated by every citizen and beneficial
for them.
